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Lwrel-crpwneS 

L ETTERS 
WALPOLE 



THE BEST LETTERS 



OF 



HORACE WALPOLE 



lEotteo irittfj an 3Intr0tiuctt0n 



By ANNA B. McMAHAN 



3 



I, 







CHICAGO 

A. C. McCLURG AND COMPANY 

1890 



. 



Copyright, 

By A. C. McClurg and Co. 

a.d. 1890. 



CONTENTS. 



PAGE 

INTRODUCTION 9 

LETTER 

I. Pleasures of Youth, and Youthful Recollections . . 25 

II. Mountains of Savoy. — Grande-Chartreuse .... 27 

III. Sir Robert Walpole's Resignation. — Created Earl of 

Orford 2° 

IV. On his Father's Death 25 

V. Enclosing Gray's Ode " On a Distant Prospect of 

Eton College" 35 

VI. Description of Strawberry Hill. — Dissolution of Par- 
liament. — Measures for carrying the Elections . . 36 
VII. Description of Strawberry Hill. — Clandestine Mar- 
riage Bill. — Execution of Dr. Cameron .... 39 
VIII. Gray's "Odes" to be Printed at Strawberry Hill . . 46 
IX. Disasters in Flanders. — Gray's "Odes." — The 

Printer's Letter 47 

X. History of Charles V. — History of Learning ... 51 

XI. n1 Congratulations on Pitt's Administration .... 55 

XII. From a Sick Room 57 

XIII. 1 George III., the New King. — Funeral of George II. . 59 
XIV. Acknowledging Receipt of Warton's " Observations 

on Spenser " 63 

XV. A Friendly Greeting 65 

XVI. Acknowledging the Receipt of Mason's Poems . . 66 
XVII. On Mr. Conway's Dismissal from all his Employ- 
ments 67 

XVIII. Picture of " The Town " 70 

XIX. Origin of the " Castle of Otranto " 74 

XX. With a Copy of the " Castle of Otranto " ?S 

XXI. Consolations of Authorship . 80 



VI 



CONTENTS. 



LETTER PAGE 

XXII. French Society and Taste 82 

XXIII. Vanity of Court Honors , . 86 

XXIV. Concerning a Particular Friend, and Friendship 

in general 89 

XXV. Visits a Wesley Meeting 95 

XXVI. ' Resigning his Seat in Parliament 96 

XXVII. In Paris again, with Madame du Deffand ... 99 

XXVIII. Literary and Dramatic Criticism 102 

XXIX. Gloomy View of Contemporary Literature and 

Politics 104 

XXX. Improvements at Strawberry Hill 107 

XXXI. On the Death of the Poet Gray in 

XXXII. Disaster at Strawberry Hill 115 

XXXIII. Tribute to Gray's Genius. — Depreciation of 

Garrick 118 

XXXIV. Selection of Gray's Letters for Publication . . 120 
XXXV. Ruin and Desolation of the Family Property . . 124 

XXXVI. On a Performance of Mason's " Elfrida " ... 125 
XXXVII. Garrick's « Christmas Tale." — In Praise of 

Music 127 

XXXVIII. Tribute to Mason as Editor and Author. — Con- 
cerning Slavery in America 130 

XXXIX. Houghton and Lawyers. — Literary Property . 133 

XL. Inducements to visit Strawberry Hill .... 137 
XLI. Degeneration of the Present Time. — Pleasures 

of Old Age 139 

XLII. An Adventure on the Thames 141 

XLIII. Cautions relating to Paris 143 

XLIV. Distressed State of the Kingdom 147 

XLV. Conduct of America contrasted with that of Eng- 
land 149 

XLVL -On Public Affairs 151 

XLV 1 1. ^Preparations for War with America 153 

XLVI1I. On a Performance of Jephson's " Braganza " . 155 

XLIX. On Mason's Life of Gray 158 

L. Charm of Madame de Sevigne's Letters. — The 

American War 162 

LT. America and the Administration 164 

LI I. Miserable Situation of England 168 

LIII. On the Declaration of Independence 171 

LIV. On the Suicide of Mr. Darner 174 



CONTENTS. 



LETTER 

LV. 

LVL 

LVII. 

LVIII. 

LIX. 

LX. 

LXI. 
LXII. 
LXIII. 
LXIV. 

LXV. 

LXVI. 

LXVII. 

LXVIII. 

LXIX. 

LXX. V 

LXXI. I 
LXXII. 

Lxxni. 

LXXIV. 

LXXV. 

LXXVI. 

LXXVII. 

LXXVIII. 

LXXIX. 

LXXX. 

LXXXI. 

LXXXII. 

LXXXIII. 

LXXXIV. 



PAGE ■ 

Gray's Cenotaph. — Mason's " Caractacus " .176 
Concerning Voltaire's Abuse of Shakspeare . . 179 
On Sir John Hawkins's " History of Music " . 181 
_0n Sensibility as a Factor in Happiness . . . 183 
Discouraging Outlook of Affairs in America . . 186 
Disclaiming Responsibility for Chatterton's Sui- 
cide 189 

Advice to a Dramatic Writer 191 

Sympathizing with the Americans 194 

England offers Peace. —Retrospection . . . 196 
Lord Chatham's Last Appearance in the House 

of Lords 199 

Death of Voltaire. — The Uncertainty of 

Worldly Matters in general 202 

Infatuation of England 204 

Genius and Villany of Chatterton 208 

Expression of Filial Affection and Family Pride 211 
Grief at the Sale of the Houghton Pictures. — 

Depreciation of Garrick 214 

New Difficulties in the Conduct of the American 

War 218 

Europe paying its Debts to America .... 222 
Johnson's Criticism on Gray. — Gibbon's 

Quarrel 225 

Self-Criticism as an Author 227 

Differs with Lady Ossory on the American 

Question 229/ 

On the Surrender of Cornwallis at Yorktown . 232 

A Visit from a Learned Editor of Shakspeare . 235 
Renewed Motion for an Address of Pacification 

with America 236 

On a Performance of Southern's "The Fatal 

Marriage," with Mrs. Siddons as Isabella . 23S 
On the Receipt of Pownall's " Character of Sir 

Robert Walpole " 241 

On the " Good Things " of Life 247 

Strawberry Hill Landscapes 250 

On the Publication of Private Letters .... 252 

Criticism on Poetry. — Madame de Sevigne . 254 
On the Receipt of " Florio," dedicated to 

himself 261 



Vlll 



CONTENTS. 



LETTER 

LXXXV. 
LXXXVI. 

lxxxvh. 
lxxxviii. 

LXXXIX. 

xc. 

XCI. 

XCII. 

XCIII. 

XCIV. 

xcv. 

XCVI. 
XCVII. 

XCVIII. 

XCIX. 

c. 



PAGE 

Acknowledging the Receipt of a Cameo . . . 262 

A Chat with Mrs. Siddons 266 

Concerning Voltaire, Mrs. Piozzi, and others . 268 

On Meeting the Misses Berry 271 

Acceptance of an Invitation 276 

On Darwin's " Botanic Garden " 277 

On the Receipt of " Bishop Bonner's Ghost" . 279 

With a Contribution for Charity 282 

A Letter of Farewell 283 

On Some New Books 286 

On his Accession to the Title Earl of Orford . 290 

On French Affairs 293 

Declining the Dedication of a Translation of 

Aulus Gellius 296 

With a Subscription. — Comments on the 

French Revolution 298 

On the Reo. pt of " Lorenzo de' Medici " . . 300 

Picture of His Old Age 304 



INTRODUCTION. 



Early in the present century Lord Byron wrote, 
"It is the fashion to underrate Horace Walpole; " 
and one has only to turn to the reviews of that 
period to confirm the truth of the statement. Suc- 
cessive volumes of Walpole Letters, appearing at in- 
tervals between the years 1798 and 1857, when the 
first complete edition was issued, seem in general to 
have been greeted by the critics with a half- patro- 
nizing, half-scornful tone, which matched ill with the 
sale of the volumes and their popularity with the gen- 
eral public. On the appearance of the Montagu col- 
lection (18 1 8), a writer in the " Edinburgh Review " 
says : " His mind as well as his house was piled up 
with Dresden china and illuminated through painted 
glass ; he was the slave of elegant trifles, and could 
no more screw himself up into a decided and solid 
personage than he could divest himself of petty 
jealousies and miniature animosities." Macaulay's 
famous dictum in the same Review (1833), "his 
mind was a bundle of inconsistent whims and affec- 
tations ; his features were covered by mask within 
mask ; when the outer disguise of obvious affectation 



10 INTRODUCTION. 

was removed, you were still as far as ever from see- 
ing the real man," is too well known to require fur- 
ther quotation ; while still more recently Thackeray 
speaks of " Horace's dandified treble," and although 
referring to the Letters as " charming volumes," it is 
plain what kind of charm he has in mind, — " Fid- 
dles sing all through them ; wax-lights, fine dresses, 
fine jokes, fine plate, fine equipages glitter and spar- 
kle there. Never was such a brilliant, jigging, smirk- 
ing Vanity Fair as that through which he leads us." 

If this be the best that can be said for these let- 
ters, why have they escaped the rubbish-heaps of a 
hundred years, and survived the numerous changes 
of literary fashion, to claim again in our day the 
place they held with their contemporaries as choice 
examples of epistolary writing? Or can any one 
read Macaulay's sketches of eighteenth-century life 
and character, or Thackeray's " Four Georges," 
without a suspicion that both Macaulay and Thack- 
eray were in conscience bound to speak more gen- 
erously of Walpole? Should the painter of the 
finished picture ignore the source of his outlines? 
Modern historians are more ingenuous, and Lecky 
and Green, as well as others of lesser note, give to 
Horace Walpole a dignified place among their 
authorities. 

Readers who are content to take their opinions 
at second-hand are puzzled to know where to place 
this man who has been so variously used and abused ; 
while those who would gladly judge for themselves 



INTR OD UC TIOJST. 1 1 

are prevented by the comparative inaccessibility and 
great bulk of Walpole's writings. Not only did he 
try his hand at many things, — poetry, fiction, his- 
tory, drama, books on art, on gardening, on politics, 
none of which were without renown in their day, — 
but his letters alone amount to nearly twenty-seven 
hundred ; and to undertake to read them seriatim 
seems somewhat appalling to the average reader. By 
common consent, Walpole's reputation rests mainly 
on these letters. Many of them, however, are too 
local in interest, and others deal too exclusively with 
dead -issues, to repay attention. The present col- 
lection aims to present what is best for the modern 
reader, — to exhibit so much of the matter and man- 
ner of these letters as to enable him to determine 
whether the writer was indeed only the wittiest of 
triflers and the vainest of fops, or whether the unde- 
niable charm he exercised over his contemporaries 
did not in truth proceed from some worthier qualities 
in the man. 

Whatever faults may have been charged against 
Walpole, at least dulness is not among them. When 
private letters continue to hold their charm after 
the lapse of a hundred years, they surely have some 
claim to be counted as classics in their kind. The 
reader will need no " sign-post criticism " to instruct 
him when and where to admire ; but familiar letters 
written for the amusement or information of private 
friends can hardly be fully appreciated without some 
knowledge of the characters both of the writer and of 



12 INTRODUCTION. 

his correspondents, some insight into the conditions, 
domestic, social, and political, which prevailed, some 
introduction to the small events, the slight allusions, 
and gossip of the different groups of friends. 

Horace Walpole's life nearly spanned the eigh- 
teenth century (1717-1797) ; and few men in it were 
better fitted both by nature and circumstance for 
seeing it both at its best and at its worst. " I feel 
what I feel, and say I feel what I do feel," he says 
to one of his correspondents ; and, with Macaulay's 
leave, we think he spoke truly. What he saw, in- 
deed, was not always pleasant to the sight nor agree- 
able in the repetition. From his earliest days there 
was much that was repellant in his home-life. Al- 
though his father, Sir Robert Walpole, was the most 
distinguished raaii of his time, — the prime minister 
of the first two Georges, — and although the tone in 
which the son says " my father " shows that he fully 
appreciated Sir Robert's best qualities, there could 
have been but little sympathy between them. The 
son was delicate in constitution, refined to fastidious- 
ness ; the father was robust, rude, hearty, and coarse. 
Not more gross than his neighbors, perhaps, Sir 
Robert's chief distinction in private life seems to have 
been his powers of drinking, toasting, swearing big 
oaths, and singing lusty songs. Consider the suffer- 
ings of a young man, of weak digestion but strong 
aesthetic sensibilities, returning to the paternal man- 
sion after an Italian tour to find himself in such 
scenes as he describes to one of his artistic friends. 



INTR OD UC TION. 



!3 



" Only imagine," he exclaims, " that I here every 
day see men who are mountains of roast beef, and 
only seem just roughly hewn out into outlines of 
human form, like the giant rock of Pratolino ! I 
shudder when I see them brandish their knives in 
act to carve, and look on them as savages that 
devour one another. I should not stare at all more 
than I do if yonder alderman at the lower end of 
the table were to stick his fork into his neighbor's 
jolly cheek and cut a brave slice of brawn and fat. 
Why, I '11 swear I see no difference between a country 
gentleman and a sirloin ; whenever the first laughs, 
or the second is cut, there run out just the same 
streams of gravy ! Indeed, the sirloin does not ask 
quite so many questions." His two brothers, Robert 
and Edward, were his seniors by many years, and 
of such dissolute and idle habits that no strong 
ties of brotherhood existed either in childhood or 
in later life. 

With his mother he was more in sympathy. She 
was a beautiful woman, and fond of admiration ; al- 
though her name is not free from ugly stories, her 
youngest son always felt the greatest veneration for 
her memory. Twenty years after her death, which 
occurred in 1737, he erected a marble statue to her 
in Westminster Abbey, with an inscription, written 
by himself, commemorating her virtues. 

At Eton, whither he went at the age of ten, he 
remained seven years. These were important years, 
for here he formed the friendships which afterwards 



1 4 IN TROD UC TIO AT. 

filled a large place in his life. He never forgot an 
Eton schoolfellow, and was always an Etonian heart 
and soul. His special mates were Thomas Gray, 
quiet and studious, and already giving signs of his 
future powers by writing graceful Latin verse and 
reading Virgil for amusement in his play-hours; 
Richard West, another poetical genius, who died too 
early in life to fulfil his youthful promise ; Thomas 
Ashton, afterwards preacher of Lincoln's Inn. A 
" quadruple alliance " they called themselves, and in 
romantic fashion assumed nicknames and fancied 
themselves rulers of imaginary kingdoms. Walpole 
himself was Tydeus ; Gray, Orasmades ; Ashton, 
Plato ; and West, Almanzor. Walpole was also mem- 
ber of a " triumvirate " with George and Charles 
Montagu. Revisiting Eton three years after leaving 
school, his letter to George Montagu is full of kindly 
recollections only. Even the memory of a flogging 
merely amuses him as he looks forward to hearing 
Ashton preach, who when he last saw him in chapel 
was " standing funking over against a conduit to be 
catechised," and thinks he " shall certainly be put 
in the bill for laughing in the church." The taste 
for classical reading acquired in these early years 
remained with him always. 

Another lasting impulse was given to his mind by 
a visit to the Continent, which began in March, 
1739, and lasted over two years. The greater part of 
the time was spent in Italy, — that foster-mother of art 
and antiquity ; and from this time a passion for these 



INTROD UCTION. 1 5 

subjects took complete possession of him and formed 
the chief interest of his years of maturity and old 
age. A great deal has been said about the fact that, 
after inviting Gray to be his companion, they quar- 
relled before the end of the journey and parted to 
return home by different routes. Whether or not the 
blame was chiefly Walpole's, as he charged upon 
himself after Gray's death, a reconciliation was after- 
wards brought about, and their correspondence re- 
sumed on the old friendly and familiar terms. Some 
of Gray's poems were first printed on Walpole's 
private press, and it was the death of Walpole's fa- 
vorite cat that inspired Gray's unique ode beginning : 

" ' Twas on this lofty vase's side, 
Where China's gayest art has dyed 

The azure flowers that blow, 
Demurest of the tabby kind, 
The pensive Selima reclined, 

Gazed on the lake below." 

In Italy also Walpole formed a close friendship 
with Sir Horace Mann, the English minister at 
Florence ; and although they never met afterwards, 
an unflagging correspondence was kept up until 
Mann's death, forty-four years later. Walpole's 
letters to him, when collected and published, filled 
seven octavo volumes. 

It was during this absence from home, and while 
he was " far gone in medals, lamps, idols, prints, etc.," 
declaring that he " would buy the Coliseum if he 
could," that he was chosen Member for Calling- 



1 6 INTRODUCTION. 

ton in the Parliament elected in June, 1741. He 
returned to England in time to take part in the stir- 
ring scenes connected with his father's fall from 
power, and to win the praise of William Pitt for his 
maiden speech, the Great Commoner adding also 
that if it was becoming in him to remember that he 
was the child of the accused, the House ought to 
remember too that they were the children of their 
country. Although he continued to hold a seat in 
the House of Commons for the next twenty-seven 
years, and although his descriptions of the scenes and 
the members furnish some of the best history of the 
times, the position was little to his taste, and except 
on special occasions aroused in him little interest. 
During all this time and later he omits no occasion 
to express his disgust with politics and politicians, — 
rather more than is becoming, indeed, considering 
that from his childhood he held sinecure govern- 
ment offices which during the greater part of his life 
yielded him annually between six and seven thousand 
pounds, and that except for these same despised 
politics he would have been unable to indulge in the 
expensive tastes which, next to friendship, formed 
the chief delight of his life. 

In friendship Walpole's capacity amounted to 
genius. Whatever may be said — and much has 
been said — about Walpole's alienation from certain 
friends at different times, these do not seem to have 
been more frequent or more serious than occur to 
most persons during a long life where interests 



INTR OD UC TION. I 7 

clash and outside distractions intrude. What is far 
more significant, and can only mean a rare capacity 
for affection, is the devotion which he both gave and 
received from a large number of persons, and these 
some of the worthiest of his time. He neglected 
no means of keeping himself en rapport with their 
thoughts and interests, he spared no pains to share 
his own with them, even carrying bits of paper and 
letter-backs in his pockets to note down any items 
of news, witticisms, or entertaining anecdotes, as 
material for his letters. Friendships between men, 
especially men immersed in public life, are by no 
means so common that we can afford to ignore so 
shining an example as that of Horace Walpole and 
his cousin, Marshal Henry S. Conway. Dating back 
to the old Eton days, and continuing until Conway's 
death, which preceded Walpole's by four years, 
there was no break in the tender confidence and 
loyal fellowship of the two men. Conway's career, 
both as soldier and statesman, was not without the 
usual vicissitudes of those callings. When an unsuc- 
cessful military expedition called down public censure 
upon Conway, Walpole's pen came eagerly to the res- 
cue to exempt his friend from any responsibility for 
the failure. When Conway's fortune was impaired by 
the loss of certain government positions, Walpole in- 
sisted on repairing the loss by sharing with his friend 
his own fortune. The issue proved this to be un- 
necessary ; but Conway, writing of it to his brother, 
said : " Horace Walpole has on this occasion shown 
2 



1 8 INTR OD UC TION. 

that warmth of friendship, that you know him capable 
of, so strongly that I want words to express my sense 
of it." George Selvvyn was another, with whom an 
unclouded friendship, beginning at eight years old, 
extended through life. 

Walpole's most notable friendships with women 
belong to the later part of his life. His correspond- 
ence with the Countess of Ossory covers a period of 
twenty- eight years, and extends to over four hundred 
letters. She is said to have been "possessed of 
a lively imagination, quick discernment, ready wit, 
great vivacity both in conversation and writing." 
Still nearer to his heart were the Berry sisters, Mary 
and Agnes, — his " twin wives," as he was fond of 
calling them. He was their senior by nearly fifty 
years, but their society was the great solace of his 
declining days. Every Sunday evening, together 
with their father, they came to his house ; he estab- 
lished them in " Little Strawberry," in order to have 
them always near, bequeathing it to them, for their 
joint lives, at his death. The uncompleted task of 
collecting and publishing his works, which he also 
left to them, was accomplished the year after his 
death, when they appeared in an edition of five vol- 
umes. Mrs. Hannah More, also many years his 
junior, was another choice spirit who cheered these 
later days. " Neither years nor suffering," she wrote 
to her sister, "can abate the entertaining powers 
of the pleasant Horace, which rather improve than 
decay." Madame du Deffand was an admirer of a 



INTROD UCTION. 1 9 

more effusive kind ; but that her sentiment was 
based on intellectual sympathy is shown by her 
bequest to him of the whole of her manuscripts, 
letters, and books of every description. She is the 
" dear old friend " so often alluded to in his letters, 
and for whose sake he sometimes visited Paris, often 
at great pain and inconvenience to himself. 

But next in his heart to these " troops of friends " 
was Strawberry Hill. " A little plaything house " he 
described it when he first took possession, shortly be- 
fore his thirtieth birthday ; it is now counted among 
the historic houses of England, owing to the artistic 
and literary interest he caused to gather about it. 
It is hardly probable that he had any complete or 
original design at the outset ; the form it gradually 
assumed was in a great measure the result of caprice 
or accident : what he sought was not an imposing 
structure or commodious house, but one in which 
his peculiar tastes might be indulged, and his hete 
rogeneous collection appear somewhat in harmony. 
If he had any suspicion that his house -building ex- 
periments were to have any lasting influence on 
architecture, there is no evidence of it. On the 
contrary, he wrote (1761) : " My buildings are 
paper, like my writings, and both will be blown 
away ten years after I am dead. If they had not 
the substantial merit of amusing me while I live, 
they would be worth little indeed." He builded 
better than he knew. He revived in men's minds 
an almost forgotten style. Eastlake, in his " History 



2 INTRODUCTION. 

of the Gothic Revival," says: "Walpole's Gothic, 
though far from reflecting the beauties of a former 
age or anticipating those which were destined to 
proceed from a development of the style, still holds 
a position in the history of English art which com- 
mands our respect, for it served to sustain a cause 
which had otherwise been wellnigh forsaken." 

One of the most valued appointments of Straw- 
berry Hill was his printing-press, which he set up in 
June, 1757. Indeed, he enjoyed considering him- 
self as printer rather than author. When besought 
to furnish material for a Life of himself for the forth- 
coming " Biographia Literaria " (1773), he answered : 
" My writings are not of a class or merit to enti- 
tle me to any distinction. ... If I have any merit 
with the public, it is for printing and preserving 
some valuable works of others ; and if ever you 
write the lives of printers, I may be enrolled in the 
number." In general, his own works were issued 
by this press ; in some cases, however, as with the 
"Castle of Otranto," he preferred ordinary publi- 
cation, in order to preserve anonymity until suc- 
cess was assured. 

In 1 791, by the death of his nephew, Horace Wal- 
pole became Earl of Orford. He was the fourth 
and last to bear the title which had been created 
for his illustrious father. Robert, his elder brother, 
had survived the father only six years. George, his 
son, the third earl, lived for forty years, to inter- 
sperse his frequent spells of insanity with a depraved 



INTR OD UC TION. 2 1 

sanity which was perhaps even more trying to his 
relatives than his disease. The new honor was a 
minor incident which Walpole deplored rather than 
welcomed. " Surely," he wrote, " a man of seventy- 
four, unless superannuated, can have the smallest 
pleasure in sitting at home in his own room and 
being called by a new name ! . . . For the empty 
title I trust you do not suppose it is anything but an 
encumbrance, by larding my busy mornings with idle 
visits of interruption, and which, when I am able to 
go out, I shall be forced to return." 

A complete biography of Horace Walpole would 
be almost synonymous with a history of the aris- 
tocratic and fashionable world of the eighteenth 
century, with occasional glimpses at contemporary 
literature, art, and politics. There are many reasons 
for his great contemporary popularity. As the son 
of a prime minister who exercised with a strong 
hand the powers of a constitutional monarch, he was 
early brought into association with the most distin- 
guished men of his time ; as a cultivated man of 
the world, he attracted to himself a coterie brilliant 
in rank, beauty, and accomplishments ; as the owner 
of a Gothic castle and a private printing-press, he 
was a power among artists and men of letters. He 
was perhaps as much overrated in his life as he was 
underrated in the generation after his death. 

But Horace Walpole's place in literature is not to 
be settled either by the splendor of his social state 
and surroundings, or by a criticism that had not 



2 2 INTROD UCTION. 

risen to a conception that one of its first requisites 
is sympathy. He was not a great original thinker, 
nor even an infallible judge of men and books ; he 
was probably somewhat dishonest as a politician. 
But he was a great master in what was a high art in 
his day, but which is wellnigh lost in our own. The 
art of letter-writing survives, if it survives at all, only 
among women. Ic is one we can ill afford to spare 
either from literature or from life. If it is ever 
again to be cultivated, we shall turn to Horace Wal- 
pole as one of the best models. He had the gift 
of seeing what went on about him, and of telling 
what he saw. Added to this was a fertile fancy, a 
memory richly stored with illustrations, and a skill in 
the use of metaphor which saved many a circumlocu- 
tion. His style arrests attention and invests even 
the commonest incidents with a charm. It is play- 
ful and discursive, but never silly or inconsequent. 
The criticism which cast these letters aside as ephe- 
meral has shown the foolishness of prophesying, for 
the sympathetic reader of to-day finds that age 
cannot wither them, nor custom stale their infinite 
variety. 

A. B. McM. 
August, 1890. 



THE BEST LETTERS 



HORACE WALPOLE. 



THE BEST LETTERS 

OF 

HORACE WALPOLE. 



i. 



PLEASURES O^ Y^UTH, AND YOUTHFUL 
RECOLLECTIONS. 

To George Moq.ta.gu, Esq. 

King's College, May 6, 1736. 
Dear George, — I agree with you entirely in 
the pleasure you take in talking over old stories, 
but can't say but I meet every day with new circum- 
stances, which will be still more pleasure to me to 
recollect. I think at our age 't is excess of joy to 
think, while we are running over past happinesses, 
that it is still in our power to enjoy as great. Nar- 
rations of the greatest actions of other people are 
tedious in comparison of the serious trifles that 
every man can call to mind of himself while he was 
learning those histories. Youthful passages of life 
are the chippings of Pitt's diamond 1 set into little 
heart-rings with mottoes, — the stone itself more 
worth, the filings more gentle and agreeable. 

1 Diamond sold by Thomas Pitt to the Regent Duke of 
Orleans. The chippings alone were valued at ,£10,000. 



26 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

Alexander, at the head of the world, never tasted 
the true pleasure that boys of his own age have en- 
joyed at the head of a school. Little intrigues, little 
schemes and policies engage their thoughts ; and at 
the same time that they are laying the foundation 
for their middle age of life, the mimic republic they 
live in furnishes materials of conversation for their 
latter age ; and old men cannot be said to be chil- 
dren a second time with greater truth from any one 
cause, than their living over again their childhood in 
imagination. To reflect on the season when first 
they felt the titillation of love, the budding passions, 
and the first dear object of their wishes ! How, unex- 
perienced, they gave credit to all the tales of roman- 
tic loves ! Dear George, were not the playing fields 
at Eton food for all manner of flights? No old 
maid's gown, though it had been tormented into all 
the fashions from King James to King George, ever 
underwent so many transformations as those poor 
plains have in my idea. At first I was contented 
with tending a visionary flock, and sighing some 
pastoral name to the echo of the cascade under the 
bridge. How happy should I have been to have 
had a kingdom only for the pleasure of being driven 
from it, and living disguised in an humble vale ! 
As I got further into Virgil and Clelia, I found my- 
self transported from Arcadia to the garden of Italy, 
and saw Windsor Castle in no other view than the 
Capitoli immobile saxum. I wish a committee of 
the House of Commons may ever seem to be the 
senate ; or a bill appear half so agreeable as a billet- 
doux. You see how deep you have carried me into 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 27 

old stories ; I write of them with pleasure, but shall 
talk of them with more to you. I can't say I am 
sorry I was never quite a schoolboy : an expedition 
against bargemen, or a match at cricket, may be 
very pretty things to recollect ; but, thank my stars, 
I can remember things that are very near as pretty. 
The beginning of my Roman history was spent in 
the asylum, or conversing in Egeria's hallowed 
grove, — not in thumping and pummelling king Amu- 
lius's herdsmen. I was sometimes troubled with a 
rough creature or two from the plough, — one that 
one should have thought had worked with his head 
as well as his hands, they were both so callous. One 
of the most agreeable circumstances I can recollect 
is the Triumvirate, composed of yourself, Charles, 
and Your sincere friend. 



II. 

MOUNTAINS OF SAVOY. — GRANDE-CHARTREUSE. 
To Richard West, Esq. 

From a Hamlet among the 

Mountains of Savoy, Sept. 28, 1739, N. S. 

Precipices, mountains, torrents, wolves, rumblings, 
Salvator Rosa — the pomp of our park and the 
meekness of our palace ! Here we are, the lonely 
lords of glorious, desolate prospects. I have kept 
a sort of resolution which I made of not writing to 
you as long as I stayed in France ; I am now a 
quarter of an hour out of it, and write to you. 



28 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

Mind, 't is three months since we heard from you. 
I begin this letter among the clouds ; where I shall 
finish, my neighbor, Heaven, probably knows : 't is 
an odd wish in a mortal letter to hope not to finish 
it on this side the atmosphere. You will have a 
billet tumble to you from the stars when you least 
think of it ; and that I should write it too ! Lord, 
how potent that sounds ! But I am to undergo many 
transmigrations before I came to "yours ever." 
Yesterday I was a shepherd of Dauphine ; to-day an 
Alpine savage ; to-morrow a Carthusian monk ; and 
Friday a Swiss Calvinist. I have one quality which 
I find remains with me in all worlds and in all 
aethers ; I brought it with me from your world, and 
am admired for it in this, — 't is my esteem for you. 
This is a common thought among you, and you will 
laugh at it ; but it is new here, — as new to remem- 
ber one's friends in the world one has left, as for you 
to remember those you have lost. 

Aix in Savoy, Sept. 30//*. 
We are this minute come in here, and here 's an 
awkward abbe this minute come in to us. I asked 
him if he would sit down. Out, oui, oui. He has 
ordered us a radish soup for supper, and has brought 
a chess-board to play with Mr. Conway. I have 
left 'em in the act, and am set down to write to 
you. Did you ever see anything like the prospect 
we saw yesterday? I never did. We rode three 
leagues to see the Grande- Chartreuse ; expected 
bad roads and the finest convent in the kingdom. 
We were disappointed pro and con. The building 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 29 

is large and plain, and has nothing remarkable but 
its primitive simplicity ; they entertained us in the 
neatest manner with eggs, pickled salmon, dried 
fish, conserves, cheese, butter, grapes, and figs, 
and pressed us mightily to lie there. We tumbled 
into the hands of a lay-brother, who, unluckily 
having the charge of the meal and bran, showed us 
little besides. They desired us to set down our 
names in the list of strangers, where, among others, 
we found two mottoes of our countrymen, for whose 
stupidity and brutality we blushed. The first was 

of Sir J D , who had wrote down the 

first stanza of Jtistiwi et tenacem, altering the last 
line to Mente quatit Carthusiana. The second was 

of one D , Caelum ipsum petimus stultitia ; et 

hie ventri i?idico bellum. The Goth ! But the 
road, West, the road ! winding round a prodigious 
mountain, and surrounded with others, all shagged 
with hanging woods, obscured with pines, or lost in 
clouds ! Below, a torrent breaking through cliffs, 
and tumbling through fragments of rocks ! Sheets 
of cascades forcing their silver speed down chan- 
nelled precipices, and hasting into the roughened 
river at the bottom ! Now and then an old foot- 
bridge, with a broken rail, a leaning cross, a cottage, 
or the ruin of an hermitage ! This sounds too bom- 
bast and too romantic to one that has not seen it, 
too cold for one that has. If I could send you my 
letter post between two lovely tempests that echoed 
each other's wrath, you might have some idea of this 
noble roaring scene as you were reading it. Almost 
on the summit, upon a fine verdure, but without 



30 LETTERS OF HORACE W A LP OLE. 

any prospect, stands the Chartreuse. We stayed 
there two hours, rode back through this charming 
picture, wished for a painter, wished to be poets ! 
Need I tell you we wished for you? Good night. 



III. 



SIR ROBERT WALPOLE'S RESIGNATION. — CREATED 
EARL OF ORFORD. 

To Sir Horace Mann. 

London, Feb. 4, 1741-42. 

I am miserable that I have not more time to 
write to you, especially as you will want to know so 
much of what I have to tell you ; but for a week or 
fortnight I shall be so hurried that I shall scarce 
know what I say. I sit here writing to you and 
receiving all the town who flock to this house ; Sir 
Robert has already had three levees this morning, 
and the rooms still overflowing — they overflow up 
to me. You will think this the prelude to some 
victory ! On the contrary, when you receive this, 
there will be no longer a Sir Robert Walpole ; you 
must know him for the future by the title of Earl of 
Orford. That other envied name expires next 
week with his Ministry ! 

Preparatory to this change I should tell you that 
last week we heard in the House of Commons the 
Chippenham election, when Jack Frederick and 
his brother-in-law, Mr. Hume, on our side, peti- 
tioned against Sir Edmund Thomas and Mr. Bayn- 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 31 

ton Rolt. Both sides made it the decisive question, 
but our people were not all equally true ; and 
upon the previous question we had but 235 against 
236, so lost it by one. From that time my broth- 
ers, my uncle, I, and some of his particular friends, 
persuaded Sir R. to resign. He was undetermined 
till Sunday night. Tuesday we were to finish the 
election, when we lost it by sixteen ; upon which 
Sir Robert declared to some particular persons in 
the House his resolution to retire, and had that 
morning sent the Prince of Wales notice of it. It 
is understood from the heads of the party that 
nothing more is to be pursued against him. Yes- 
terday (Wednesday) the King adjourned both 
Houses for a fortnight, for time to settle things. 
Next week Sir Robert resigns and goes into the 
House of Lords. The only change yet fixed is that 
Lord Wilmington is to be at the head of the Treas- 
ury; but numberless other alterations and con- 
fusions must follow. The Prince will be reconciled, 
and the Whig-patriots will come in. There were a 
few bonfires last night, but they are very unfash- 
ionable, for never was fallen minister so followed. 
When he kissed the King's hand to take his first 
leave, the King fell on his neck, wept, and kissed 
him, and begged to see him frequently) He will 
continue in town and assist the Ministry in the Lords. 
Mr. Pelham has declared that he will accept noth- 
ing that was Sir Robert's ; and this moment the 
Duke of Richmond has been here from Court to 
tell Sir R. that he had resigned the Mastership of 
the Horse, having received it from him unasked, 



32 LETTERS OF HORACE W ALP OLE. 

and that he would not keep it beyond his Ministry. 
This is the greater honor, as it was so unexpected, 
and as he had no personal friendship with the 
Duke. 

For myself, I am quite happy to be free from all 
the fatigue, envy, and uncertainty of our late 
situation. I go everywhere, indeed, to have the 
stare over, and to use myself to neglect ; but I meet 
nothing but civilities. Here have been Lord Har- 
rington, Coke, and poor Fitzwilliam, and others 
crying ; here has been Lord Deskford and numbers 
to wish me joy, — in short, it is a most extraordinary 
and various scene. 

There are three people whom I pity much, — the 
King, Lord Wilmington, and my own sister : x the 
first, for the affront, to be forced to part with his 
minister, and to be forced to forgive his son ; the 
second, as he is too old, and (even when he was 
young) unfit for the burden ; and the poor girl, 
who must be created an earl's daughter, as her 
birth would deprive her of the rank. She must 
kiss hands and bear the flirts of impertinent real 
quality. 

I am invited to dinner to-day by Lord Strafford, 2 
Argyll's son-in-law. You see we shall grow the 
fashion. 

1 Maria, natural daughter of Sir R. W. by Maria Skerret, 
his mistress, whom he afterwards married. She had a 
patent to take place as an earl's daughter. 

2 William Wentworth, second Earl of Strafford, of the 
second creation, Walpole's correspondent and neighbor at 
Twickenham. He married Lady Anne Campbell, second 
daughter of John, Duke of Argyll. 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. $$ 

My dear child, these are the most material 
points ; I am sensible how much you must want 
particulars, but you must be sensible, too, that just 
yet I have not time. 

Don't be uneasy. Your brother Ned has been 
here to wish me joy; your brother Gal. has been 
here and cried. Your tender nature will at first 
make you like the latter; but afterwards you will 
rejoice with your elder and me. Adieu ! Yours 
ever and the same. 



IV. 

ON HIS FATHER'S DEATH. 
To Sir Horace Mann. 

Arlington Street, 1 April 15, 1745. 
By this time you have heard of my Lord's death ; 
I fear it will have been a very great shock to you. 
I hope your brother will write you all the particu- 
lars ; for my part, you can't expect I should enter 
into the details of it. His enemies pay him the 
compliment of saying, " they do believe now that 
he did not plunder the public, as he was accused 
(as they accused him) of doing, he having died in 
such circumstances." If he had no proofs of his 
honesty but this, I don't think this would be such 
indisputable authority; not leaving immense riches 

1 The Arlington Street house was left by Sir Robert 
Walpole to his son Horace, who made it his chief town- 
house until his death. 

3 



34 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

would be scanty evidence of his not having acquired 
them, there happening to be such a thing as spend- 
ing them. ^It is certain he is dead very poor : his 
debts, with his legacies, which are trifling, amount 
to fifty thousand pounds ; his estate, a nominal 
eight thousand a-year, much mortgaged/ In short, 
his fondness for Houghton has endangered Hough- 
ton. 1 If he had not so overdone it, he might have 
left such an estate to his family as might have 
secured the glory of the place for many years ; 
another such debt must expose it to sale. If he 
had lived, his unbounded generosity and contempt 
of money would have run him into vast difficulties.. 
However irreparable his personal loss may be to 
his friends, he certainly died critically well for him- 
self: he had lived to stand the rudest trials with 
honor, to see his character universally cleared, his 
enemies brought to infamy for their ignorance or 
villany, and the world allowing him to be the only 
man in England fit to be what he had been; and 
he died at a time when his age and infirmities 
prevented his again undertaking the support of a 
government which engrossed his whole care, and 
which he foresaw was falling into the last confusion. 
In this I hope his judgment failed ! His fortune 
attended him to the last ; for he died, of the most 
painful of all distempers, with little or no pain. . . . 

1 In the county of Norfolk, and the ancestral home of the 
Wal poles. 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 35 



ENCLOSING GRAY'S ODE "ON A DISTANT PROSPECT 
OF ETON COLLEGE " 

To the Hon. H. S. Conway. 

Windsor {still), Oct. 3, 1746. 
My Dear Harry, — You ask me if I am really 
grown a philosopher. Really I believe not ; for I 
shall refer you to my practice rather than to my 
doctrine, and have really acquired what they only 
pretend to seek, — k content. So far, indeed, I was 
a philosopher even when I lived in town, for then I 
was content too ; and all the difference I can con- 
ceive between those two opposite doctors was that 
Aristippus loved London, and Diogenes Windsor; 
and if your master the Duke, whom I sincerely 
prefer to Alexander, and who certainly can inter- 
cept more sunshine, would but stand out of my 
way, which he is extremely in while he lives in the 
Park here, 1 I should love my little tub of forty 
pounds a year more than my palace dans la rue 
des ministres, with all my pictures and bronzes, 
which you ridiculously imagine I have encumbered 
myself with in my solitude. Solitude it is as to the 
tub itself, for no soul lives in it with me, — though I 
could easily give you room at the butt-end of it, 
and with vast pleasure ; but George Montagu, who 
perhaps is a philosopher too, though I am sure not 

1 William Augustus, Duke of Cumberland, third son of 
George the Second, was at his Lodge with a noisy train. 



36 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

of Pythagoras' s silent sect, lives but two barrels off; 
and Ashton, a Christian philosopher of our acquain- 
tance, lives at the foot of that hill which you men- 
tion with a melancholy satisfaction that always 
attends the reflection. Apropos, here is an Ode 
on the very subject, which I desire you will please 
to like excessively. 1 

You will immediately conclude, out of good 
breeding, that it is mine, and that it is charming. 
I shall be much obliged to you for the first thought, 
but desire you will retain only the second ; for it is 
Mr. Gray's, and not your humble servant's. 



VI. 



DESCRIPTION OF STRAWBERRY HILL. — DISSOLUTION 
OF PARLIAMENT. — MEASURES FOR CARRYING THE 
ELECTIONS. 

To the Hon. H. S. Conway. 

Twickenham, June 8, 1747. 
You perceive by my date that I am got into a 
new camp, and have left my tub at Windsor. It is 
a little plaything-house that I got out of Mrs. Chene- 
vix's 2 shop, and is the prettiest bauble you ever saw. 
It is set in enamelled meadows, with filigree hedges : 

1 The Ode on a Distant Prospect of Eton College, which 
follows here, was not printed until the following year. 

2 Mrs. Chenevix, of whom Walpole bought the property, 
was a dealer in toys. 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 37 

A small Euphrates through the piece is roll'd, 
And little finches wave their wings in gold. 

Two delightful roads, that you would call dusty, 
supply me continually with coaches and chaises ; 
barges as solemn as Barons of the Exchequer move 
under my window ; Richmond Hill and Ham walks 
bound my prospect ; but, thank God ! the Thames 
is between me and the Duchess of Queensberry. 1 
Dowagers as plenty as flounders inhabit all around, 
and Pope's ghost is just now skimming under my 
window by a most poetical moonlight. I have 
about land enough to keep such a farm as Noah's 
when he set up in the ark with a pair of each kind ; 
but my cottage is rather cleaner than I believe his 
was after they had been cooped up together forty 
days. The Chenevixes had tricked it out for them- 
selves ; up two pair of stairs is what they call Mr. 
Chenevix's library, furnished with three maps, one 
shelf, a bust of Sir Isaac Newton, and a lame tele- 
scope without any glasses. Lord John Sackville 
predecessed me here, and instituted certain games 
called cricketalia, which have been celebrated this 
very evening in honor of him in a neighboring 
meadow. 

You will think I have removed my philosophy 
from Windsor with my tea-things hither ; for I am 
writing to you in all this tranquillity while a Parlia- 
ment is bursting about my ears. You know it is 
going to be dissolved. I am told you are taken 

1 Catherine Hyde, great granddaughter of Lord Chancellor 
Clarendon, — a woman of great eccentricities in speech and 
dress. 



38 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

care of, though I don't know where, nor whether 
anybody that chooses you will quarrel with me 
because he does choose you, as that little bug the 
Marquis of Rockingham did, — one of the calamities 
of my life which I have bore as abominably well as 
I do most about which I don't care. They say the 
Prince has taken up two hundred thousand pounds, 
to carry elections which he won't carry; he had 
much better have saved it to buy the Parliament 
after it is chosen. A new set of peers are in embryo, 
to add more dignity to the silence of the House of 
Lords. 

I make no remarks on your campaign, 1 because, 
as you say, you do nothing at all, — which, though 
very proper nutriment for a thinking head, does 
not do quite so well to write upon. If any one 
of you can but contrive to be shot upon your post, 
it is all we desire, shall look upon it as a great curi- 
osity, and will take care to set up a monument to 
the person so slain ; as we are doing by vote to 
Captain Cornewall, who was killed at the beginning 
of the action in the Mediterranean four years ago. 
In the present dearth of glory, he is canonized ; 
though, poor man ! he had been tried twice the year 
before for cowardice. 2 

I could tell you much election news, none else ; 
though not being thoroughly attentive to so impor- 
tant a subject as, to be sure, one ought to be, I 

1 Mr. Conway was in Flanders with the Duke of Cum- 
berland. 

2 On charges that were proved groundless on both 
occasions. 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 39 

might now and then mistake, and give you a candi- 
date for Durham in place of one for Southampton, 
or name the returning officer instead of the candi- 
date. In general, I believe, it is much as usual, — 
those sold in detail that afterwards will be sold in 
the representation ; ;the ministers bribing Jacobites 
to choose friends of their own ; the name of well- 
wishers to the present establishment, and patriots 
outbidding ministers that they may make the better 
market of their own patriotism) (in short, all Eng- 
land, under some name or other, is just now to be 
bought and sold ; though whenever we become 
posterity and forefathers, we shall be in high repute 
for wisdom and virtue. My great-great-grandchil- 
dren will figure me with a white beard down to my 
girdle, and Mr. Pitt's will believe him unspotted 
enough to have walked over nine hundred hot plough- 
shares without hurting the sole of his foot. How 
merry my ghost will be, and shake its ears to hear 
itself quoted as a person of consummate prudence ! 
Adieu, dear Harry ! 

Yours ever. 



VII. 



DESCRIPTION OF STRAWBERRY HILL. — CLANDESTINE 
MARRIAGE BILL. — EXECUTION OF DR. CAMERON. 

To Sz'r Horace Mann. 

Strawberry Hill, June 12, 1753. 
I could not rest any longer with the thought of 
your having no idea of a place of which you hear so 



40 LETTERS OF HORACE W ALP OLE. 

much, and therefore desired Mr. Bentley 1 to draw 
you as much idea of it as the post would be per- 
suaded to carry from Twickenham to Florence. The 
enclosed enchanted little landscape, then, is Straw- 
berry Hill ; and I will try to explain so much of it 
to you as will help to let you know whereabouts 
we are when we are talking to you, — for it is un- 
comfortable in so intimate a correspondence as ours 
not to be exactly master of every spot where one 
another is writing or reading or sauntering. This 
view of the castle is what I have just finished, and 
is the only side that will be at all regular. Directly 
before it is an open grove, through which you see a 
field, which is bounded by a serpentine wood of all 
kind of trees and flowering shrubs and flowers. 
The lawn before the house is situated on the top of 
a small hill, from whence to the left you see the 
town and church of Twickenham encircling a turn 
of the river, that looks exactly like a seaport in 
miniature. The opposite shore is a most delicious 
meadow, bounded by Richmond Hill, which loses 
itself in the noble woods of the park to the end of 
the prospect on the right, where is another turn of 
the river, and the suburbs of Kingston as luckily 
placed as Twickenham is on the left ; and a natural 
terrace on the brow of my hill, with meadows of my 
own down to the river, commands both extremities. 
Is not this a tolerable prospect? You must figure 
that all this is perpetually enlivened by a navigation 

1 Richard Bentley, described by Walpole as having " more 
sense, judgment, and wit, more taste and more misfortunes, 
than sure ever met in any man." 



LETTERS OE HORACE WALPOLE. 41 

of boats and barges, and by a road below my terrace, 
with coaches, post-chaises, wagons, and horsemen 
constantly in motion, and the fields speckled with 
cows, horses, and sheep. Now you shall walk into 
the house. The bow- window below leads into a 
little parlor hung with a stone-color Gothic paper 
and Jackson's Venetian prints, which I could never 
endure while they pretended, infamous as they are, 
to be after Titian, etc., but when I gave them this 
air of barbarous bas-reliefs, they succeeded to a mi- 
racle ; it is impossible at first sight not to conclude 
that they contain the history of Attila or Tottila, 
done about the very era. From hence, under two 
gloomy arches, you come to the hall and staircase, 
which it is impossible to describe to you, as it is the 
most particular and chief beauty of the castle. 
Imagine the walls covered with (I call it paper, but 
it is really paper painted in perspective to represent) 
Gothic fretwork : the lightest Gothic balustrade to 
the staircase, adorned with antelopes (our sup- 
porters) bearing shields ; lean windows fattened 
with rich saints in painted glass, and a vestibule 
open with three arches on the landing-place, and 
niches full of trophies of old coats-of-mail, Indian 
shields made of rhinoceros's hides, broadswords, 
quivers, long-bows, arrows, and spears, — all supposed 
to be taken by Sir Terry Robsart x in the holy wars. 
But as none of this regards the enclosed drawing, I 
will pass to that. The room on the ground-floor 
nearest to you is a bedchamber hung with yellow 

1 An ancestor of Sir Robert Walpole who was Knight of 
the Garter, 



42 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

paper and prints, framed in a new manner invented 
by Lord Cardigan, — that is, with black and white 
borders printed. Over this is Mr. Chute's bed- 
chamber, hung with red in the same manner. The 
bow- window room, one pair of stairs, is not yet 
finished ; but in the tower beyond it is the charm- 
ing closet where I am now writing to you. It is 
hung with green paper and water-color pictures ; 
has two windows : the one in the drawing looks to 
the garden, the other to the beautiful prospect ; and 
the top of each glutted with the richest painted 
glass of the arms of England, crimson roses, and 
twenty other pieces of green, purple, and historic 
bits. I must tell you, by the way, that the castle, 
when finished, will have two and thirty windows 
enriched with painted glass. In this closet, which 
is Mr. Chute's College of Arms, are two presses with 
books of heraldry and antiquities, Madame Sevign£'s 
Letters, and any French books that relate to her and 
her acquaintance. Out of this closet is the room 
where we always live, hung with a blue-and-white 
paper in stripes adorned with festoons, and a thou- 
sand plump chairs, couches, and luxurious settees 
covered with linen of the same pattern, and with a 
bow- window commanding the prospect, and gloomed 
with limes that shade half each window, already 
darkened with painted glass in chiaroscuro set in 
deep-blue glass. Under this room is a cool little 
hall, where we generally dine, hung with paper to 
imitate Dutch tiles. 

I have described so much that you will begin to 
think that all the accounts I used to give you of the 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 43 

diminutiveness of our habitation were fabulous ; but 
it is really incredible how small most of the rooms 
are. The only two good chambers I shall have are 
not yet built : they will be an eating-room and a 
library, each twenty by thirty, and the latter fifteen 
feet high. For the rest of the house, I could send 
it you in this letter as easily as the drawing, only 
that I should have nowhere to live till the return of 
the post. The Chinese summer-house, which you 
may distinguish in the distant landscape, belongs to 
my Lord Radnor. We pique ourselves upon noth- 
ing but simplicity, and have no carvings, gildings, 
paintings, inlayings, or tawdry businesses. 

You will not be sorry, I believe, by this time to 
have done with Strawberry Hill and to hear a little 
news. The end of a very dreaming session has been 
extremely enlivened by an accidental bill which has 
opened great quarrels, and those not unlikely to 
be attended with interesting circumstances. A bill 
to prevent clandestine marriages, so drawn by the 
judges as to clog all matrimony in general, was in- 
advertently espoused by the Chancellor ; and having 
been strongly attacked in the House of Commons 
by Nugent, the Speaker, Mr. Fox, and others, the 
last went very great lengths of severity on the whole 
body of the law, and on its chieftain in particular, 
which, however, at the last reading he softened and 
explained off extremely. This did not appease ; but 
on the return of the bill to the House of Lords, 
where our amendments were to be read, the Chan- 
cellor in the most personal terms harangued against 
-Fox, and concluded with saying that " he despised 



44 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

his scurrility as much as his adulation and recanta- 
tion." As Christian charity is not one of the oaths 
taken by privy- counsellors, and as it is not the most 
eminent virtue in either of the champions, this quarrel 
is not likely to be soon reconciled. There are na- 
tures whose disposition it is to patch up political 
breaches ; but whether they will succeed, or try to 
succeed, in healing this, can I tell you? 

The match for Lord Granville, which I announced 
to you, is not concluded ; his flames are cooled in 
that quarter as well as in others. 

I begin a new sheet to you, which does not match 
with the other, for I have no more of the same paper 
here. Dr. Cameron is executed, and died with the 
greatest firmness. His parting with his wife the night 
before was heroic and tender. He let her stay till 
the last moment, when being aware that the gates of 
the Tower would be locked, he told her so. She fell 
at his feet in agonies ; he said, " Madam, this was 
not what you promised rae,'1 and embracing her, 
forced her to retire ; then with the same coolness 
looked at the window till her coach was out of sight, 
after which he turned about and wept. ([His only 
concern seemed to be at the ignominy of Tyburn ; 
he was not disturbed at the dresser for his body, or 
at the fire to burn his bowels. ) The crowd was so 
great that a friend who attended him could not get 
away, but was forced to stay and behold the execu- 
tion. But what will you say to the minister or priest 
who accompanied him? (The wretch, after taking 
leave, went into a landau, where, not content with 
seeing the Doctor hanged, he let down the top of 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 45 

the landau for the better convenience of seeing him 
embowelled") I cannot tell you positively that what 
I hinted of this Cameron being commissioned from 
Prussia 1 was true, but so it is believed. Adieu, my 
dear child ; I think this is a very tolerable letter for 
summer ! 

1 In his Memoirs, Walpole gives the following account 
of the taking of Dr. Cameron : " About this time was taken 
in Scotland Dr. Archibald Cameron, a man excepted by the 
Act of Indemnity. Intelligence had been received some time 
before of his intended journey to Britain, with a commission 
from Prussia to offer arms to the disaffected Highlanders, at 
the same time that ships were hiring in the North to trans- 
port men. The fairness of Dr. Cameron's character, com- 
pared with the severity he met from a government most laud- 
ably mild to its enemies, confirmed this report. That Prussia, 
who opened its inhospitable arms to every British rebel, should 
have tampered in such a business, was by no means improb- 
able. That King hated his uncle. But could a Protestant po- 
tentate dip in designs for restoring a popish government ? Of 
what religion is policy ? To what sect is royal revenge big- 
oted? The Queen-dowager, though sister of our King, was 
avowedly a Jacobite, — by principle so ; and it was natural. 
What prince, but the single one who profits by the princi- 
ple, can ever think it allowable to overturn sacred hereditary 
right ? It is the curse of sovereigns that their crimes should 
be unpunishable." 



46 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 



VIII. 

GRAY'S "ODES 1 ' TO BE PRINTED AT STRAWBERRY 
HILL 

To John Chute, Esq. 

Strawberry Hill, July 12, 1757. 
It would be very easy to persuade me to a Vine- 
voyage?- without your being so indebted to me, if it 
were possible. I shall represent my impediments, 
and then you shall judge. I say nothing of the heat 
of this magnificent weather, with the glass yesterday 
up to three-quarters of sultry. In all English prob- 
ability this will not be a hindrance long ; though at 
present, so far from travelling, I have made the tour 
of my own garden but once these three days before 
eight at night, and then I thought I should have 
died of it. (For how many years we shall have to 
talk of the summer of fifty-seven ! But hear : my 
Lady Ailesbury and Miss Rich come hither on Thurs- 
day for two or three days ; and on Monday next the 
Ofiicma Arbuteana opens in form. ' The Stationers' 
Company, that is, Mr. Dodsley, Mr. Tonson, etc., are 
summoned to meet here on Sunday night. And with 
what do you think we open ? Cedite, Romani Im- 
pressores, — with nothing under Graii Carmina. I 
found him [Gray] in town last week ; he had brought 
his two Odes to be printed. I snatched them out 

1 To visiting Mr. Chute at his seat, the Vine, in Hamp- 
shire. Chute was one of the friends with whom Walpole and 
Gray travelled in Italy. 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 47 

of Dodsley's hands, and they are to be tne first-traits 
of my press. An edition of Hentznerus, with a ver- 
sion by Mr. Bentley and a little preface of mine, were 
prepared, but are to wait. Now, my dear sir, can 
I stir? 

" Not ev'n thy virtues, tyrant, shall avail ! " 

Is not it the plainest thing in the world that I can- 
not go to you yet, but that you must come to me ? 

I tell you no news, for I know none, think of none. 
Elzevir, Aldus, and Stephens are the freshest person- 
ages in my memory. Unless I was appointed printer 
of the Gazette, I think nothing could at present make 
me read an article in it. Seriously, you must come 
to us, and shall be witness that the first holidays we 
have I will return with you. Adieu ! 



IX. 



DISASTERS IN FLANDERS. —GRAY'S "ODES." — THE 
PRINTER'S LETTER. 

To Sir Horace Mann. 

Strawberry Hill, Aug. 4, 1757. 
Mr. Phelps (who is Mr. Phelps?) has brought 
me the packet safe ; for which I thank you. I would 
fain have persuaded him to stay and dine, that I 
might ask him more questions about you. He told 
me how low your ministerial spirits are : I fear the 
news that came last night will not exalt them. The 
French attacked the Duke for three days together, 



43 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

and at last defeated him. I find it is called at Ken- 
sington an encounter 1 of fourteen squadrons ; but 
any defeat must be fatal to Hanover. I know few 
particulars, and those only by a messenger des- 
patched to me by Mr. Conway on the first tidings : 
the Duke exposed himself extremely, but is unhurt, 
as they say all his small family are. In what a situ- 
ation is our Prussian hero, surrounded by Austrians, 
French, and Muscovites, — even impertinent Sweden 
is stealing in to pull a feather out of his tail ! What 
devout plunderers will every little Catholic prince of 
the Empire become ! The only good I hope to ex- 
tract out of this mischief is, that it will stifle our 
secret expedition, and preserve Mr. Conway from 
going on it. I have so ill an opinion of our secret 
expeditions that I hope they will forever remain 
so. What a melancholy picture is there of an old 
monarch at Kensington, who has lived to see such 
inglorious and fatal days ! Admiral Boscawen is 
disgraced. I know not the cause exactly, as ten 
miles out of town are a thousand out of politics. He 
is said to have refused to serve under Sir Edward 
Hawke in this armament. Shall I tell you what, 
more than distance, has thrown me out of attention 
to news? A little packet which I shall give your 
brother for you, will explain it. In short, I am 
turned printer, and have converted a little cottage 
here into a printing-office. My abbey is a perfect 
college or academy. I keep a painter [Miintz] in 
the house, and a printer [Robinson], — not to men- 
tion Mr. Bentley, who is an academy himself. I 
1 The battle at Hastenbeck. 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE 49 

send you two copies (one for Dr. Cocchi) 1 of a very 
honorable opening of my press, — two amazing Odes 
of Mr. Gray; they are Greek, they are Pindaric, 
they are sublime ! consequently I fear a little ob- 
scure ; the second particularly, by the confinement 
of the measure and the nature of prophetic vision, is 
mysterious. I could not persuade him to add more 
notes ; he says whatever wants to be explained, don't 
deserve to be. I shall venture to place some in Dr. 
Cocchi's copy, who need not be supposed to under- 
stand Greek and English together, though he is so 
much master of both separately. To divert you in 
the mean time, I send you the following copy of a 
letter written by my printer 2 to a friend in Ireland. 
I should tell you that he has the most sensible look 
in the world ; Garrick said he would give any money 
for four actors with such eyes, — they are more 
Richard the Third's than Garrick's own ; but what- 
ever his eyes are, his head is Irish. Looking for 
something I wanted in a drawer, I perceived a 
parcel of strange, romantic words in a large hand 
beginning a letter ; he saw me see it, yet left it, 
which convinces me it was left on purpose : it is the 
grossest flattery to me, couched in most ridiculous 
scraps of poetry, which he has retained from things 
he has printed ; but it will best describe itself : — 

Sir, — I date this from shady bowers, nodding 
groves, and amaranthine shades, — close by old Father 

1 A learned physician and author at Florence, — a particular 
friend of Mann's. 

2 William Robinson, first printer to the press at Strawberry 
Hill. 

4 



50 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

Thames's silver side, fair Twickenham's luxurious 
shades, Richmond's near neighbor, where great George 
the King resides. You will wonder at my prolixity; 
in my last I informed you that I was going into the 
country to transact business for a private gentleman. 
This gentleman is the Hon. Horatio Walpole, son 
to the late great Sir Robert Walpole, who is very 
studious and an admirer of all the liberal arts and 
sciences; amongst the rest he admires printing He 
has fitted out a complete printing-house at this his 
country seat, and has done me the favor to make me 
sole manager and operator (there being no one but my- 
self). All men of genius resorts his house, courts his 
company, and admires his understanding ; what with 
his own and their writings, I believe I shall be pretty 
well employed. I have pleased him, and I hope to 
continue so to do. Nothing can be more warm than 
the weather has been here this time past ; they have in 
London, by the help of glasses, roasted in the Artillery- 
ground fowls and quarters of lamb. The coolest days 
that I have felt since May last are equal to, nay, far 
exceed, the warmest I ever felt in Ireland. The place I 
am in now is all my comfort from the heat ; the situa- 
tion of it is close to the Thames, and is Richmond 
Gardens (if you were ever in them) in miniature, sur- 
rounded by bowers, groves, cascades, and ponds, and 
on a rising ground not very common in this part of 
the country; the building elegant, and the furniture 
of a peculiar taste, magnificent and superb. He is a 
bachelor, and spends his time in the studious rural 
taste — not like his father, lost in the weather-beaten 
vessel of state — many people censured, but his conduct 
was far better than our late pilot's at the helm, and more 
to the interest of England ; they follow his advice now, 
and court the assistance of Spain, instead of provoking 
a war, for that was ever against England's interest." 



LETTERS OF HORACE W A LP OLE. 51 

I laughed for an hour at this picture of myself, 
which is much more like to the studious magician 
in the enchanted opera of Rinaldo : not but Twick- 
enham has a romantic genteelness that would figure 
in a more luxurious climate. It was but yesterday 
that we had a new kind of auction, — it was of the 
orange-trees and plants of your old acquaintance, 
Admiral Martin. It was one of the warm days of 
this jubilee summer, which appears only once in fifty 
years — the plants were disposed in little clumps 
about the lawn ; the company walked to bid from 
one to the other, and the auctioneer knocked down 
the lots on the orange-tubs. Within three doors 
was an auction of China. You did not imagine that 
we were such a metropolis ! Adieu ! 



X. 

HISTORY OF CHARLES V. — HISTORY OF LEARNING. 
To Dr. William Robertson. 

March 4, 1759. 
If I can throw in any additional temptation to 
your disposition for writing, it is worth my while, even 
at the hazard of my judgment and my knowledge, 
both of which, however, are small enough to make 
me tender of them. Before I read your History, I 
should probably have been glad to dictate to you, 
and (I will venture to say it; it satirises nobody 
but myself) should have thought I did honor to an 
obscure Scotch clergyman by directing his studies 



52 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

with my superior lights and abilities. How you have 
saved me, sir, from making a ridiculous figure, by 
making so great an one yourself ! But could I sus- 
pect that a man I believe much younger, and whose 
dialect I scarce understood, and who came to me 
with all the diffidence and modesty of a very mid- 
dling author, and who I was told had passed his 
life in a small living near Edinburgh, — could I sus- 
pect that he had not only written what all the world 
now allows the best modern history, but that he had 
written it in the purest English, and with as much 
seeming knowledge of men and courts as if he had 
passed all his life in important embassies ? In short, 
sir, I have not power to make you, what you ought 
to be, a Minister of State ; but I will do all I can, — 
I will stimulate you to continue writing, and I shall 
do it without presumption. 

I should like either of the subjects you mention, 
and I can figure one or two others that would shine 
in your hands. In one light the History of Greece 
seems preferable. You have all the materials for it 
that can possibly be had. It is concluded, it is clear 
of all objections ; for perhaps nobody but I should 
run wildly into passionate fondness for liberty, if I 
was writing about Greece. It even might, I think, 
be made agreeably new, and that by comparing the 
extreme difference of their manners and ours, par- 
ticularly in the article of finances, — a system almost 
new in the world. 

With regard to the History of Charles V. it is a 
magnificent subject and worthy of you. It is more, 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 53 

— it is fit for you ; for you have shown that you can 
write on ticklish subjects with the utmost discretion, 
and on subjects of religious party with temper and 
impartiality. Besides, by what little I have skimmed 
of history myself, I have seen how many mistakes, 
how many prejudices, may easily be detected : and 
though much has been written on that age, probably 
truth still remains to be written of it. Yet I have an 
objection to this subject. Though Charles V. was 
in a manner the Emperor of Europe, yet he was a 
German or a Spaniard. Consider, sir, by what you 
must have found in writing the History of Scotland, 
how difficult it would be for the most penetrating 
genius of another country to give an adequate idea 
of Scottish story. So much of all transactions must 
take their rise from and depend on national laws, 
customs, and ideas, that I am persuaded a native 
would always discover great mistakes in a foreign 
writer. 

Greece indeed is a foreign country, but no Greek 
is alive to disprove one. 

There are two other subjects which I have some- 
times had a mind to treat myself; though my nam- 
ing one of them will tell you why I did not. It was 
the History of Learning. Perhaps indeed it is a 
work which could not be executed unless intended 
by a young man from his first looking on a book 
with reflection. The other is the history of what I 
may in one light call the most remarkable period of 
the world, by containing a succession of five good 
princes : I need not say they were Nerva, Trajan, 
Adrian, and the two Antonines. Not to mention that 



54 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

no part almost of the Roman History has been well 
written from the death of Domitian, this period 
would be the fairest pattern for use, if History can 
ever effect what she so much pretends to, — doing 
good. I should be tempted to call it the " History of 
Humanity ; " for though Trajan and Adrian had pri- 
vate vices that disgraced them as men, as princes 
they approached to perfection. Marcus Aurelius 
arrived still nearer, perhaps with a little ostentation ; 
yet vanity is an amiable machine if it operates to 
benevolence. Antoninus Pius seems to have been 
as good as human nature royalized can be. Adrian's 
persecution of the Christians would be objected, but 
then it is much controverted. I am no admirer of 
elective monarchies ; and yet it is remarkable that 
when Aurelius's diadem descended to his natural 
heir, not to the heir of his virtues, the line of bene- 
ficence was extinguished ; for I am sorry to say that 
hereditary and bad are almost synonymous. 

But I am sensible, sir, that I am a bad adviser 
for you ; the chastity, the purity, the good sense 
and regularity of your manner, that unity you men- 
tion, and of which you are the greatest master, 
should not be led away by the licentious frankness, 
and, I hope, honest indignation of my way of 
thinking. I may be a fitter companion than a 
guide ; and it is with most sincere zeal that I offer 
myself to contribute any assistance in my power 
towards polishing your future work, whatever it 
shall be. You want little help ; I can give little, — 
and indeed I, who am taxed with incorrectnesses, 
should not assume airs of a corrector. My Cata- 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 55 

logue 1 I intended should have been exact enough 
in style : it has not been thought so by some ; I 
tell you, that you may not trust me too much. Mr. 
Gray, a very perfect judge, has sometimes censured 
me for parliamentary phrases, familiar to me as 
your Scotch law is to you. I might plead for my 
inaccuracies that the greatest part of my book was 
written with people talking in the room ; but that 
is no excuse to myself, who intended it for correct. 
However, it is easier to remark inaccuracies in the 
work of another than in one's own ; and since you 
command me, I will go again over your second 
volume with an eye to the slips, — a light in which 
I certainly did not intend my second examination 
of it. 



XI. 

CONGRATULATIONS ON PITT'S ADMINISTRATION. 

To The Right Hon. William Pitt. 

Arlington Street, Nov. 19, 1759. 
Sir, — On coming to town I did myself the 
honor of waiting on you and Lady Hester Pitt ; 
and though I think myself extremely distinguished 
by your obliging note, I should be sorry for having 
given you the trouble of writing it, if it did not 
lend me a very pardonable opportunity of saying 
what I much wish to express, but thought myself 
too private a person, and of too little consequence, 

1 His Catalogue of Royal and Noble Authors, — a sec- 
ond edition of which had been recently published. 



56 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

to take the liberty to say. In short, sir, I was 
eager to congratulate you on the lustre you have 
thrown on this country ; I wished to thank you for 
the security you have fixed to me of enjoying the 
happiness I do enjoy. You have placed England 
in a situation in which it never saw itself, — a task 
the more difficult, as you had not to improve, but 
recover. 

In a trifling book [A Catalogue of Royal and 
Noble Authors] written two or three years ago, I 
said (speaking of the name in the world the most 
venerable to me) : " Sixteen unfortunate and in- 
glorious years since his removal have already writ- 
ten his eulogium." It is but justice to you, sir, to 
add that that period ended when your adminis- 
tration began. 

Sir, do not take this for flattery ; there is nothing 
in your power to give that I would accept, — nay, 
there is nothing I could envy but what I believe 
you would scarce offer me, — your glory. This may 
seem very vain and insolent; but consider, sir, 
what a monarch is a man who wants nothing ^'con- 
sider how he looks down on one who is only the 
most illustrious man in England ! But, sir, free- 
doms apart, insignificant as I am, probably it must 
be some satisfaction to a great mind like yours to 
receive incense when you are sure there is no 
flattery blended with it ; and what must any Eng- 
lishman be that could give you a moment's satis- 
faction and would hesitate? 

Adieu, sir ! I am unambitious, I am uninter- 
ested, but I am vain. You have, by your notice, 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 57 

uncanvassed, unexpected, and at a period when you 
certainly could have the least temptation to stoop 
down to me, flattered me in the most agreeable 
manner. If there could arrive the moment when 
you could be nobody and I anybody, you cannot 
imagine how grateful I would be. In the mean 
time permit me to be, as I have been ever since I 
had the honor of knowing you, sir, your most 
obedient, humble servant. 



XII. 

FROM A SICK ROOM. 

To George Montagu, Esq. 

Strawberry Hill, Aug, 12, 1760. 
In what part of the island you are just now, I 
don't know, — flying about somewhere or other, I 
suppose. Well, it is charming to be so young ! 
.Here am I lying upon a couch, wrapped up in 
flannels, with the gout in both feet, — oh, yes, gout 
in all the forms ! Six years ago I had it, and no- 
body would believe me ; now they may have proof. 
My legs are as big as your cousin Guilford's, and 
they don't use to be quite so large. I was seized 
yesterday sennight; have had little pain in the 
day, but most uncomfortable nights : however, I 
move about again a little with a stick. If either 
my father or mother had had it, I should not dislike 
it so much. I am herald enough to approve it if 
descended genealogically; but it is an absolute 



58 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

upstart in me, and what is more provoking, I had 
trusted to my great abstinence for keeping me 
from it. But thus it is, if I had any gentleman-like 
virtue, as patriotism or loyalty, I might have got 
something by them ; I had nothing but that beg- 
garly virtue temperance, and she had not interest 
enough to keep me from a fit of the gout. Another 
plague is that everybody that ever knew anybody 
that had it, is so good as to come with advice and 
direct me how to manage it, — that is, how to con- 
trive to have it for a great many years. I am very 
refractory ; I say to the gout, as great personages 
do to the executioners, " Friend, do your work as 
quick as you can." They tell me of wine to keep 
it out of my stomach ; but I will starve temperance 
itself, I will be virtuous indeed, — that is, I will 
stick to virtue, though I find it is not its own 
reward. 

This confinement has kept me from Yorkshire ; I 
hope, however, to be at Ragley by the 20th, from 
whence I shall still go to Lord Strafford's, — and 
by this delay you may possibly be at Greatworth 
by my return, which will be about the beginning 
of September. Write me a line as soon as you 
receive this, — direct it to Arlington Street ; it will 
be sent after me. Adieu. 

P. S. — My tower erects its battlements bravely ; 
my Anecdotes of Painting thrive exceedingly, thanks 
to the gout, that has pinned me to my chair. Think 
of Ariel the sprite in a slit shoe ! 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 59 



XIII. 

GEORGE III., THE NEW KING. - FUNERAL OF 
GEORGE II. 

To George Montagu, Esq. 

Arlington Street, Nov. 13, 1760. 
Even the honeymoon of a new reign don't pro- 
duce events every day. There is nothing but the 
common saying of addresses and kissing hands. 
The chief difficulty is settled; Lord Gower yields 
the Mastership of the Horse to Lord Huntingdon, 
and removes to the Great Wardrobe, from whence 
Sir Thomas Robinson was to have gone into Ellis's 
place, but he is saved. The City, however, have a 
mind to be out of humor ; a paper has been fixed 
on the Royal Exchange, with these words, " No 
petticoat Government, no Scotch Minister, no Lord 
George Sackville,]' — two hints totally unfounded, 
and the other scarce true. No petticoat ever gov- 
erned less, it is left at Leicester-house ; Lord 
George's breeches are as little concerned ; and 
except Lady Susan Stuart and Sir Harry Erskine, 
nothing has yet been done for any Scots. For the 
King himself he seems all good-nature, and wishing 
to satisfy everybody ; all his speeches are obliging. 
I saw him again yesterday, and was surprised to 
find the levee-room had lost so entirely the air of 
the lion's den. (This Sovereign don't stand in one 
spot with his eyes fixed royally on the ground, and 
dropping bits of German news ; he walks about, 



60 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

and speaks to everybody. I saw him afterwards on 
the throne, where he is graceful and genteel, sits 
with dignity, and reads his answers to addresses 
well ; it was the Cambridge address carried by the 
Duke of Newcastle in his Doctor's gown, and look- 
ing like the Medeciu malgre lui. He had been 
vehemently solicitous for attendance, for fear my 
Lord Westmoreland, who vouchsafes himself to 
bring the address from Oxford, should outnumber 
him. Lord Lichfield and several other Jacobites 
have kissed hands j George Selwyn says, " They go 
to St. James's because now there are so many 
Stuarts there." 

Do you know, I had the curiosity to go to the 
burying t'other night; I had never seen a royal 
funeral, — nay, I walked as a rag of quality, which 
I found would be, and so it was, the easiest way 
of seeing it. It is absolutely a noble sight. The 
Prince's chamber, hung with purple, and a quantity 
of silver lamps, the coffin under a canopy of purple 
velvet, and six vast chandeliers of silver on high 
stands, had a very good effect. The Ambassador 
from Tripoli and his son were carried to see that 
chamber. The procession, through a line of foot- 
guards, every seventh man bearing a torch, the horse- 
guards lining the outside, their officers with drawn 
sabres and crape sashes on horseback, the drums 
muffled, the fifes, bells tolling, and minute-guns, — 
all this was very solemn. But the charm was the 
entrance of the Abbey, where we were received by 
the Dean and Chapter in rich robes, the choir and 
almsmen bearing torches ; the whole Abbey so illu- 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 6 1 

minated that one saw it to greater advantage than 
by day, — the tombs, long aisles, and fretted roof, all 
appearing distinctly, and with the happiest chiaro- 
scuro'. | There wanted nothing but incense, and little 
chapels here and there, with priests saying mass for 
the repose of the defunct ; yet one could not com- 
plain of its not being catholic enough. I had been 
in dread of being coupled with some boy of ten 
years old ; but the heralds were not very accurate, 
and I walked with George Grenville, taller and older, 
to keep me in countenance. When we came to the 
chapel of Henry the Seventh, all solemnity and de- 
corum ceased ; no order was observed, people sat 
or stood where they could or would ; the yeomen 
of the guard were crying out for help, oppressed by 
the immense weight of the coffin ; the Bishop read 
sadly, and blundered in the prayers ; the fine chap- 
ter, " Man that is born of a woman," was chanted, not 
read ; and the anthem, besides being immeasurably 
tedious, would have served as well for a nuptial. The 
real serious part was the figure of the Duke of Cum- 
berland, heightened by a thousand melancholy cir- 
cumstances. He had a dark brown adonis, and a 
cloak of black cloth, with a train of five yards. At- 
tending the funeral of a father could not be pleas- 
ant, — his leg extremely bad, yet forced to stand upon 
it near two hours ; his face bloated and distorted 
with his late paralytic stroke, which has affected, 
too, one of his eyes, and placed over the mouth of 
the vault, into which, in all probability, he must 
himself so soon descend : think how unpleasant a 
situation ! He bore it all with a firm and unaffected 



62 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

countenance. This grave scene was fully contrasted 
by the burlesque Duke of Newcastle. iHe fell into 
a fit of crying the moment he came into the chapel, 
and flung himself back in a stall, the Archbishop 
hovering over him with a smelling-bottle ; but in 
two minutes his curiosity got the better of his hypoc- 
risy, and he ran about the chapel with his glass to 
spy who was or was not there, spying with one hand, 
and mopping his eyes with the other} Then re- 
turned the fear of catching cold ; and the Duke of 
Cumberland, who was sinking with heat, felt himself 
weighed down, and turning round, found it was the 
Duke of Newcastle standing upon his train, to avoid 
the chill of the marble. It was very theatric to look 
down into the vault, where the coffin lay, attended 
by mourners with lights. Clavering, the groom of 
the bedchamber, refused to sit up with the body, and 
was dismissed by the King's order. 

I have nothing more to tell you, but a trifle, a 
very trifle. The King of Prussia has totally defeated 
Marshal Daun. This, which would have been pro- 
digious news a month ago, is nothing to-day ; it only 
takes its turn among the questions, " Who is to be 
groom of the bedchamber ? what is Sir T. Robinson 
to have?" I have been to Leicester-fields to-day; 
the crowd was immoderate. I don't believe it will 
continue so. Good night. Yours ever. 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 63 



XIV. 

ACKNOWLEDGING RECEIPT OF WARTON'S "OBSERVA- 
TIONS ON SPENSER." 

To the Rev. Thomas Warton. 

Strawberry Hill, Aug. 21, 1762. 

Sir, — I was last week surprised with a very un- 
expected present in your name, and still more when, 
upon examining it, I found myself so much, and so 
undeservedly, distinguished by your approbation. I 
certainly ought to have thanked you immediately, 
but I chose to defer my acknowledgments till I had 
read your volumes very attentively. The praise you 
have bestowed on me debars me, sir, from doing 
all the justice I ought to your work. The pleasure I 
received from it would seem to have grown out of 
the satisfaction I felt in what, if it would not be un- 
grateful, I should be humble enough to call flattery ; 
for how can you, sir, approve such hasty, superfi- 
cial writings as mine, — you, who in the same pur- 
suits are so much more correct, and have gone so 
much deeper? For instance, compare your account 
of Gothic architecture with mine : I have scarce 
skimmed the subject ; you have ascertained all its 
periods. If my " Anecdotes " should ever want an- 
other edition, I shall take the liberty of referring the 
readers to your chronicle of our buildings. 

With regard to the Dance of Death, I must con- 
fess you have not convinced me. Vertue (for it was 
he, not I, that first doubted of that painting at Basil) 



64 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

persuaded me by the arguments I found in his MSS., 
and which I have given, that Holbein was not the 
author. The latter's prints, as executed by Hollar, 
confirmed me in that opinion ; and you must forgive 
me if I still think the taste of them superior to Al- 
bert Diirer. This is mere matter of opinion, and of 
no consequence, and the only point in your book, 
sir, in which I do not submit to you and agree with 
you. 

You will not be sorry to be informed, sir, that 
in the library of the Antiquarian Society there is a 
large and very good print of Nonsuch, giving a toler- 
able idea of that pile, which was not the case of 
Speed's confused scrap. I have myself drawings of 
the two old palaces of Richmond and Greenwich, 
and should be glad to show them to you if at any 
time of your leisure you would favor me with a visit 
here. You would see some attempts at Gothic, 
some miniatures of scenes which I am pleased to 
find you love. Cloisters, screens, round-towers, and 
a printing-house, all indeed of baby dimensions, 
would put you a little in mind of the age of Caxton 
and Wynken. You might play at fancying yourself 
in a castle described by Spenser. 

You see, sir, by the persuasions I employ, how 
much I wish to tempt you hither ! I am, sir, your 
most obliged and obedient servant. 

P. S. — You know, to be sure, that in Ames's " Ty- 
pographical Antiquities" are specified all the works 
of Stephen Hawes. 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 65 

XV. 

A FRIENDLY GREETING. 
To the Earl of Strafford. 

Strawberry Hill, Aug. 10, 1763. 
My dear Lord, — I have waited in hopes that 
the world would do something worth telling you ; it 
will not, and I cannot stay any longer without ask- 
ing you how you do, and hoping you have not quite 
forgot me. It has rained such deluges that I had 
some thoughts of turning my Gallery into an ark, 
and began to pack up a pair of bantams, a pair of 
cats, — in short, a pair of every living creature about 
my house ; but it is grown fine at last, and the work- 
men quit my Gallery to-day without hoisting a sail in 
it. I know nothing upon earth but what the ancient 
ladies in my neighborhood knew threescore years 
ago y I write merely to pay you my peppercorn of 
affection and to inquire after my lady, who I hope 
is perfectly well. A longer letter would not have 
half the merit ; a line in return will however repay 
all the merit I can possibly have to one to whom I 
am so much obliged. 



66 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

XVI. 

ACKNOWLEDGING THE RECEIPT OF MASON'S POEMS. 

To the Rev. Willia?n Mason. 

Arlington Street, Dec. 29, 1763. 
Sir, — Your bookseller has brought me the vol- 
ume of your Works, for which I give you a thousand 
thanks ; I have read them again in this form with 
great satisfaction. I wish in return that I had any- 
thing literary to tell you or send you that would 
please you half as much. I should be glad to know 
how to convey to you another volume of my Anec- 
dotes and a volume of Engravers, which will be 
published in a fortnight or three weeks ; but they 
will be far from amusing you. If the other volumes 
were trifling, these are ten times more so ; nothing 
but my justice to the public, to whom I owed them, 
could have prevailed over my dissatisfaction with 
them, and have made me produce them. The 
painters in the third volume are more obscure, 
most of them, than those in the former ; and the 
facts relating to them have not even the patina of 
ambiguity to hide and consecrate their insignificance. 
The tome of Engravers is a mere list of very bad 
prints. You will find this account strictly true, and 
no affectation. To make you some amends, it will 
not be long before I have the pleasure of sending you 
by far the most curious and entertaining book that 
my press has produced ; if it diverts you as much 
as it does Mr. Gray and me, you will think it the 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE 67 

most delightful book you ever read ; and yet, out of 
one hundred and fifty pages, you had better skip 
the fifty first. Are not you impatient to know what 
this curiosity is and to see it ? It is the Life of the 
famous Lord Herbert of Cherbury, and written by 
himself: of the contents I will not anticipate one 
word. I address this letter to Aston, upon the 
authority of your book. I should be sorry if it mis- 
carried only as it is a mark of my gratitude. 

I am, sir, you much obliged, humble servant. 



XVII. 

ON MR. CONWAY'S DISMISSAL FROM ALL HIS 
EMPLOYMENTS. 

To the Hon. H. S. Conway. 

Strawberry Hill, Saturday night, eight o'clock, 
April 21, 1764. 

I write to you with a very bad headache ; I 
have passed a night, for which George Grenville 
and the Duke of Bedford shall pass many an uneasy 
one ! Notwithstanding I heard from everybody I 
met that your Regiment, as well as Bedchamber, 
were taken away, I would not believe it, till last 
night the Duchess of Grafton 1 told me that the 
night before the Duchess of Bedford said to her, 
" Are not you very sorry for poor Mr. Conway ? 
He has lost everything." When the Witch of En- 
dor pities, one knows she has raised the devil. 

1 Afterwards Countess of Ossory of Walpole's voluminous 
correspondence. 



68 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

I am come hither alone to put my thoughts into 
some order, and to avoid showing the first sallies of 
my resentment, which I know you would disapprove ; 
nor does it become your friend to rail. My anger 
shall be a little more manly, and the plan of my 
revenge a little deeper laid, than in peevish bon- 
mots. You shall judge of my indignation by its 
duration. 

In the mean time let me beg you, in the most 
earnest and most sincere of all professions, to suffer 
me to make your loss as light as it is in my power 
to make it : i I have six thousand pounds in the 
funds; accept all, or what part you want. Do not 
imagine I will be put off with a refusal. The re- 
trenchment of my expenses, which I shall from this 
hour commence, will convince you that I mean 
to replace your fortune as far as I can. When I 
thought you did not want it, I had made another 
disposition. You have ever been the dearest per- 
son to me in the world. You have shown that you 
deserve to be so. You suffer for your spotless 
integrity. Can I hesitate a moment to show that 
there is at least one man who knows how to value 
you? The new will, which I am going to make, 
will be a testimonial of my own sense of virtue. -» 

One circumstance has heightened my resentment. 
If it was not an accident, it deserves to heighten 
it. The very day on which your dismission was 
notified, I received an order from the Treasury for 
the payment of what money was due to me there. 
Is it possible that they could mean to make any 
distinction between us? Have I separated myself 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 69 

from you? Is there that spot on earth where I can 
be suspected of having paid court? Have I even 
left my name at a Minister's door since you took 
your part? If they have dared to hint this, the 
pen that is now writing to you will bitterly un- 
deceive them. 

I am impatient to see the letters you have re- 
ceived, and the answers you have sent. Do you 
come to town? If you do not, I will come to 
you to-morrow sennight, that is, the 29th. I give 
no advice on anything, because you are cooler 
than I am, — not so cool, I hope, as to be insensible 
to this outrage, this villany, this injustice ! You 
owe it to your country to labor the extermination 
of such Ministers ! 

I am so bad a hypocrite that I am afraid of 
showing how deeply I feel this. Yet last night I 
received the account from the Duchess of Grafton 
with more temper than you believe me capable of; 
but the agitation of the night disordered me so 
much that Lord John Cavendish, who was with 
me two hours this morning, does not, I believe, 
take me for a hero. As there are some who I know 
would enjoy my mortification, and who probably 
designed I should feel my share of it, I wish to 
command myself; but that struggle shall be added 
to their bill. I saw nobody else before I came 
away but Legge, who sent for me and wrote the 
enclosed for you. He would have said more both 
to you and Lady Ailesbury, 1 but I would not let 
him, as he is so ill ; however, he thinks himself 
1 Conway's wife. 



70 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

that he shall live. I hope he will ! I would not 
lose a shadow that can haunt these Ministers. 

I feel for Lady Ailesbury, because I know she 
feels just as I do, — and it is not a pleasant sen- 
sation. I will say no more, though I could write 
volumes. Adieu ! Yours, as I ever have been and 
ever will be. 



XVIII. 

PICTURE OF "THE TOWN." 

To Geoj'ge Montagu, Esq. 

Arlington Street, Dec. 16, 1764. 
As I have not read in the paper that you died 
lately at Greatworth, in Northamptonshire, nor have 
met with any Montagu or Trevor in mourning, I con- 
clude you are living ; I send this, however, to inquire, 
and if you should happen to be departed, hope 
your executor will be so kind as to burn it. Though 
you do not seem to have the same curiosity about 
my existence, you may gather from my handwriting 
that I am still in being ; which being perhaps full 
as much as you want to know of me, I will trouble 
you with no farther particulars about myself, — nay, 
nor about anybody else ; your curiosity seeming to 
be pretty much the same about all the world. 
News there are certainly none, nobody is even 
dead, as the Bishop of Carlisle [Lyttelton] told me 
to-day, — which I repeat to you in general; though 
I apprehend in his own mind he meant no possessor 
of a better bishopric. 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 71 

If you like to know the state of the town, here 
it is. In the first place, it is very empty ; in the 
next, there are more diversions than the week will 
hold. A charming Italian opera, with no dances 
and no company, at least on Tuesdays ; to supply 
which defect, the subscribers are to have a ball and 
supper, — a plan that in my humble opinion will fill 
the Tuesdays and empty the Saturdays. At both 
playhouses are woful English operas, — which, how- 
ever, fill better than the Italian, patriotism being 
entirely confined to our ears ; how long the sages 
of the law may leave us those I cannot say. Mrs. 
Cornells, 1 apprehending the future assembly at Al- 
mack's, has enlarged her vast room and hung it with 
blue satin, and another with yellow satin ; but Al- 
mack's room, which is to be ninety feet long, proposes 
to swallow up both hers as easily as Moses's rod gob- 
bled down those of the magicians. Well, but there 
are more joys, — a dinner and assembly every Tues- 
day at the Austrian minister's ; ditto on Thursdays 
at the Spaniard's ; ditto on Wednesdays and Sun- 
days at the French ambassador's ; besides Madame 
de Welderen's on Wednesdays, Lady Harrington's 
Sundays, and occasional private mobs at my Lady 
Northumberland's. Then for the mornings, there 
are levees and drawing-rooms without end, — not 
to mention the Maccaroni Club, which has quite 
absorbed Arthur's ; (for you know old fools will 
hobble after young onesX Of all these pleasures, 
I prescribe myself a very^small pittance, — my dark 
corner in my own box at the Opera, and now and 
1 A German singer. 



72 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

then an ambassador, to keep my French going till 
my journey to Paris. Politics are gone to sleep, 
like a paroli at pharaoh ; though there is the finest 
tract lately published that ever was written, called 
an " Inquiry into the Doctrine of Libels." It 
would warm your old Algernon blood ; but for 
what anybody cares, might as well have been 
written about the wars of York and Lancaster. 
The thing most in fashion is my edition of Lord 
Herbert's Life ; people are mad after it, — I believe 
/because only two hundred were printed ; and by 
the numbers that admire it, I am convinced that 
if I had kept his lordship's counsel, very few 
would have found out the absurdity of it. The 
caution with which I hinted at its extravagance, has 
passed with several for approbation, and drawn on 
theirs. This is nothing new to me ; it is when 
one laughs out at their idols that one angers 
peopled I do not wonder now that Sir Philip 
Sidney was the darling hero, when Lord Herbert, 
who followed him so close and trod in his steps, 
is at this time of day within an ace of rivalling 
him. I wish I had let him ; it was contradicting 
one of my own maxims, which I hold to be very 
just : that it is idle to endeavor to cure the world 
of any folly, unless we could cure it of being 
foolish. 

Tell me whether I am likely to see you before 
I go to Paris, which will be early in February. 
I hate you for being so indifferent about me. I 

1 Montague was related on his mother's side to Algernon 
Sidney. 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 73 

live in the world, and yet love nothing, care a 
straw for nothing but two or three old friends 
that I have loved these thirty years. You have 
buried yourself with half-a-dozen parsons and 
'squires, and yet never cast a thought upon those 
you have always lived with. You come to town 
for two months, grow tired in six weeks, hurry 
away, and then one hears no more of you till next 
winter. I don't want you to like the world, I like 
it no more than you ; but I stay a while in it, be- 
cause while one sees it one laughs at it, but when 
one gives it up one grows angry with it, — and I 
hold it much wiser to laugh than to be out of 
humor. You cannot imagine how much ill blood 
this perseverance has cured me of ; I used to say 
to myself, " Lord ! this person is so bad, that per- 
son is so bad, I hate them." I have now found out 
that they are all pretty much alike, and I hate 
nobody. Having never found you out but for 
integrity and sincerity, I am much disposed to 
persist in a friendship with you ; but if I am 
to be at all the pains of keeping it up, I shall 
imitate my neighbors (I don't mean those at next 
door, but in the Scripture sense of neighbor, — any- 
body), and say, "That is a very good man, but 
I don't care a farthing for him." Till I have 
taken my final resolution on that head, I am yours 
most cordially. 



74 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

XIX. 

ORIGIN OF THE " CASTLE OF OTRANTO." 

To the Rev. William Cole} 

Strawberry Hill, March 9, 1765. 
Dear Sir, — I had time to write but a short note 
with the " Castle of Otranto," as your messenger 
called on me at four o'clock, as I was going to dine 
abroad. Your partiality to me and Strawberry have, 
I hope, inclined you to excuse the wildness of the 
story. You will even have found some traits to put 
you in mind of this place. When you read of the 
picture quitting its panel, did not you recollect the 
portrait of Lord Falkland, all in white, in my Gal- 
lery? Shall I even confess to you what was the 
origin of this romance ? I waked one morning, in the 
beginning of last June, from a dream, of which all 
I could recover was that I had thought myself in 
an ancient castle (a very natural dream for a head 
filled like mine with Gothic story), and that on the 
uppermost bannister of a great staircase I saw a gi- 
gantic hand in armor. In the evening I sat down 
and began to write, without knowing in the least 
what I intended to say or relate. The work grew 
on my hands, and I grew fond of it — add that I 
was very glad to think of anything rather than 
politics. In short, I was so engrossed with my tale, 
which I completed in less than two months, that one 

1 A distinguished antiquary, vicar of Burnham in the 
county of Bucks. 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 75 

evening I wrote from the time I had drunk my tea, 
about six o'clock, till half an hour after one in the 
morning, when my hand and fingers were so weary 
that I could not hold the pen to finish the sentence 
but left Matilda and Isabella talking, in the middle 
of a paragraph. You will laugh at my earnestness ; 
but if I have amused you, by retracing with any 
fidelity the manners of ancient days, I am content, 
and give you leave to think me as idle as you 
please. 

You are, as you have long been to me, exceed- 
ingly kind, and I should with great satisfaction em- 
brace your offer of visiting the solitude of Blechley, 
though my cold is in a manner gone, and my cough 
quite, if I was at liberty \ but I am preparing for my 
fresh journey, and have forty businesses upon my 
hands, and can only now and then purloin a day, or 
half a day, to come hither. You know I am not 
cordially disposed to your French journey, which is 
much more serious, as it is to be much more lasting. 
However, though I may suffer by your absence, I 
would not dissuade what may suit your inclination 
and circumstances. One thing, however, has struck 
me which I must mention, though it would depend 
on a circumstance that would give me the most real 
concern. It was suggested to me by that real fond- 
ness I have for your MSS., for your kindness about 
which I feel the utmost gratitude. You would not, 
I think, leave them behind you ; and are you aware 
of the danger you would run if you settled entirely 
in France ? Do you know that the King of France 
is heir to all strangers who die in his dominions, by 



76 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

what they call the Droit d'Aubaine? Sometimes, 
by great interest and favor, persons have obtained a 
remission of this right in their lifetime ; and yet that, 
even that, has not secured their effects from being 
embezzled. (Old Lady Sandwich had obtained this 
remission, and yet, though she left everything to the 
present Lord, her grandson, a man for whose rank 
one should have thought they would have had re- 
gard, the King's officers forced themselves into her 
house, after her death, and plundered; You see, if 
you go, I shall expect to have your MSS. deposited 
with me. Seriously, you must leave them in safe 
custody behind you. 

Lord Essex's trial is printed with the State Trials. 
In return for your obliging offer, I can acquaint 
you with a delightful publication of this winter, A 
Collection of Old Ballads and Poetry, in three vol- 
umes, many from Pepys's Collection at Cambridge. 
There were three such published between thirty and 
forty years ago, but very carelessly, and wanting 
many in this set, — indeed, there were others, of a 
looser sort, which the present editor [Dr. Percy], 
who is a clergyman, thought it decent to omit. 

When you go into Cheshire, and upon your ram- 
ble, may I trouble you with a commission? but 
about which you must promise me not to go a step 
out of your way. Mr. Bateman has got a cloister at 
Old Windsor, furnished with ancient wooden chairs, 
most of them triangular, but all of various patterns, 
and carved and turned in the most uncouth and 
whimsical forms. He picked them up, one by one, 
for two, three, five, or six shillings apiece from dif- 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 77 

ferent farm-houses in Herefordshire. I have long 
envied and coveted them. There may be such 
in poor cottages in so neighboring a county as 
Cheshire. I should not grudge any expense for 
purchase or carriage, and should be glad even of a 
couple such for my cloister here. When you are 
copying inscriptions in a churchyard in any village, 
think of me, and step into the first cottage you see ; 
but don't take further trouble than that. 

I long to know what your bundle of manuscripts 
from Cheshire contains. 

My bower is determined, but not at all what it is 
to be. Though I write romances, I cannot tell how 
to build all that belongs to them. Madame Danois, 
in the Fairy Tales, used to tapestry them with jon- 
quils ; but as that furniture will not last above a 
fortnight in the year, I shall prefer something more 
huckaback. I have decided that the outside shall 
be of treillage, which, however, I shall not commence 
till I have again seen some of old Louis's old-fash- 
ioned Galanteries at Versailles. Rosamond's bower, 
you and I and Tom Hearne know, was a labyrinth ; 
but as my territory will admit of a very short clew, 
I lay aside all thoughts of a mazy habitation : though 
a bower is very different from an arbor, and must 
have more chambers than one. In short, I both 
know and don't know what it should be. I am 
almost afraid I must go and read Spenser, and wade 
through his allegories and drawling stanzas, to get 
at a picture. But good night ! you see how one 
gossips when one is alone and at quiet on one's 
own dunghill ! Well, it may be trifling ; yet it is 



78 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

such trifling as Ambition never is happy enough to 
know ! Ambition orders palaces, but it is Content 
that chats for a page or two over a bower!} 



XX. 

WITH A COPY OF THE "CASTLE OF OTRANTO." 

To Dr, Joseph Warton. 

Arlington Street, March 16, 1765. 
Sir, — You have shown so much of what I fear I 
must call partiality to me that I could not in con- 
science send you the trifle that accompanies this 
till the unbiassed public, who knew not the author, 
told me that it was not quite unworthy of being 
offered to you. Still, I am not quite sure whether 
its ambition of copying the manners of an age which 
you love, may not make you too favorable to it, or 
whether its awkward imitation of them may not sub- 
ject it to your censure. In fact, it is but partially 
an imitation of ancient romances ; being rather in- 
tended for an attempt to blend the marvellous of 
old story with the natural of modern novels. This 
was in great measure the plan of a work which, to 
say the truth, was begun without any plan at all. 
But I will not trouble you, sir, at present with en- 
larging on my design, which I have fully explained 
in a preface prepared for a second edition, which 
the sale of the former makes me in a hurry to send 
out. I do not doubt, Sir, but you have with pleasure 
looked over more genuine remains of ancient days, 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 79 

— the three volumes of old Poems and Ballads ; 
most of them are curious, and some charming. The 
dissertations too I think are sensible, concise, and 
unaffected. Let me recommend to you also the 
perusal of the Life of Petrarch, of which two large 
volumes in quarto are already published by the Abbe 
de Sade, with the promise of a third. Three quartos 
on Petrarch will not terrify a man of your curiosity, 
though without omitting the memoirs and anecdotes 
of Petrarch's age, the most valuable part of the work, 
they might have been comprised in much less com- 
pass ; many of the sonnets might have been sunk, 
and almost all his translations of them. Though 
Petrarch appears to have been far from a genius, 
singly excepting the harmonious beauty of his words, 
yet one forgives the partiality of a biographer, though 
Monsieur de Sade seems as much enchanted with 
Petrarch as the age was in which he lived, whilst 
their ignorance of good authors excuses their bigotry 
to the restorer of taste. You will not, I believe, be so 
thoroughly convinced as the biographer seems to be, 
of the authentic discovery of Laura's body, and the 
sonnet placed on her bosom. When a lady dies of 
the plague in the height of its ravages, it is not very 
probable that her family thought of interring poetry 
with her, or indeed of anything but burying her body 
as quickly as they could ; nor is it more likely that 
a pestilential vault was opened afterwards for that 
purpose. I have no doubt but that the sonnet was 
prepared and slipped into the tomb when they were 
determined to find her corpse. When you read the 
notes to the second volume, you will grow very 



So LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

impatient for Monsieur de St. Palaye's promised his- 
tory of the Troubadours. Have we any manuscript 
that could throw light on that subject? 

I cannot conclude, Sir, without reminding you of 
a hope you once gave me of seeing you in town or 
at Strawberry Hill. I go to Paris the end of May 
or beginning of June for a few months, where I 
should be happy if I could execute any literary 
commission for you. 



XXI. 

CONSOLATIONS OF AUTHORSHIP. 

To Sir David Dalrymple. 1 

Strawberry Hill, April 21, 1765. 
Sir, — Except the mass of Conway papers, on 
which I have not yet had time to enter seriously, I 
am sorry I have nothing at present that would 
answer your purpose. Lately, indeed, I have had 
little leisure to attend to literary pursuits. I have 
been much out of order with a violent cold and 
cough for great part of the winter ; and the dis- 
tractions of this country, which reach even those 
who mean the least to profit by their country, have 
not left even me, who hate politics, without some 
share in them. Yet as what one does not love, 
cannot engross one entirely, I have amused myself 
a little with writing. Our friend Lord Finlater will 

1 Author of The Annals of Scotland. 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 8 1 

perhaps show you the fruit of that trifling, though 
I had not the confidence to trouble you with such a 
strange thing as a miraculous story, of which I fear 
the greatest merit is the novelty. 

I have lately perused with much pleasure a col- 
lection of old ballads [Percy's], to which I see, sir, 
you have contributed with your usual benevolence. 
Continue this kindness to the public, and smile as I 
do when the pains you take for them are misunder- 
stood or perverted. Authors must content them- 
selves with hoping that two or three intelligent 
persons in an age will understand the merit of their 
writings, and those authors are bound in good 
breeding to suppose that the public in general is 
enlightened. •They who are in the secret know 
how few of that public they have any reason to 
wish should read their works. I beg pardon of my 
masters the public, and am confident, sir, you will 
not betray me ; but let me beg you not to defraud 
the few that deserve your information, in compli- 
ment to those who are not capable of receiving it. 
Do as I do about my small house here. Every- 
body that comes to see it or me are so good as to 
wonder that I don't make this or that alteration. I 
never haggle with them, but always say I intend it. 
They are satisfied with the attention and themselves, 
and I remain with the enjoyment of my house as I 
like it. Adieu, dear sir ! 



S2 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

XXII. 

FRENCH SOCIETY AND TASTE. 

To George Montagu, Esq. 

Paris, Sept. 22, 1765. 

The concern I felt .at not seeing you before I 
left England might make me express myself warmly, 
but I assure you it was nothing but concern, nor 
was mixed with a grain of pouting. I knew some 
of your reasons, and guessed others. The latter 
grieve me heartily ; but I advise you to do as I do : 
when I meet with ingratitude, I take a short leave 
both of it and its host. Formerly I used to look 
out for indemnification somewhere else ; but having 
lived long enough to learn that the reparation gen- 
erally proved a second evil of the same sort, I am 
content now to skin over such wounds with amuse- 
ments, which at least leave no scars. It is true, 
amusements do not always amuse when we bid 
them ; I find it so here. Nothing strikes me ; 
everything I do is indifferent to me. I like the 
people very well and their way of life very well : 
but as neither were my object, I should not much 
care if they were any other people, or it was any 
other way of life. I am out of England, and my 
purpose is answered. 

Nothing can be more obliging than the reception 
I meet with everywhere. It may not be more 
sincere (and why should it?) than our cold and 
bare civility; but it is better dressed and looks 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 83 

natural : one asks no more. I have begun to sup 
in French houses, and as Lady Hertford has left 
Paris to-day, shall increase my intimacies. There 
are swarms of English here, but most of them are 
going, to my great satisfaction. As the greatest 
part are very young, they can no more be enter- 
taining to me than I to them ; and it certainly was 
not my countrymen that I came to live with. 
Suppers please me extremely ; I love to rise and 
breakfast late, and to trifle away the day as I like. 
There are sights enough to answer that end, and 
shops, you know, are an endless field for me. The 
city appears much worse to me than I thought I 
remembered it; the French music as shocking as 
I knew it was. The French stage is fallen off, 
though in the only part I have seen Le Kain I 
admire him extremely. He is very ugly and ill- 
made, and yet has an heroic dignity which Garrick 
wants, and great fire. The Dumenil I have not 
seen yet, but shall in a day or two. It is a mortifi- 
cation that I cannot compare her with the Clairon, 
who has left the stage. Grandval I saw through a 
whole play without suspecting it was he. Alas ! 
four and twenty years make strange havoc with us 
mortals. You cannot imagine how this struck me ! 
The Italian comedy, now united with their opera 
comique, is their most perfect diversion ; but alas ! 
harlequin, my dear favorite harlequin, my passion, 
makes me more melancholy than cheerful. In- 
stead of laughing, I sit silently reflecting how every- 
thing loses charms when one's own youth does not 
lend it gilding ! When we are divested of that 



84 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

eagerness and illusion with which our youth pre- 
sents objects to us, we are but the caput mortuum 
of pleasure. 

Grave as these ideas are, they do not unfit me 
for French company. The present tone is serious 
enough in conscience. Unluckily, the subjects of 
their conversation are duller to me than my own 
thoughts, which may be tinged with melancholy 
reflections, but I doubt from my constitution will 
never be insipid. 

The French affect philosophy, literature, and 
freethinking : the first never did, and never will 
possess me ; of the two others I have long been 
tired. Freethinking is for one's self, surely not for 
society. Besides, one has settled one's way of think- 
ing, or knows it cannot be settled ; and for others I 
do not see why there is not as much bigotry in 
attempting conversions from any religion as to it) 
I dined to-day with a dozen savants ; and though all 
the servants were waiting, the conversation was 
much more unrestrained, even on the Old Testa- 
ment, than I would suffer at my own table in Eng- 
land if a single footman was present. For literature 
it is very amusing when one has nothing else to 
do. I think it rather pedantic in society, tiresome 
when displayed professedly; and besides, in this 
country one is sure it is only the fashion of the day. 
Their taste in it is worst of all : could one believe 
that when they read our authors, Richardson and 
Mr. Hume should be their favorites ? The latter is 
treated here with perfect veneration. His History, 
so falsified in many points, so partial in as many, so 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 85 

very unequal in its parts, is thought the standard of 
writing. 

In their dress and equipages they are grown very 
simple. We English are living upon their old gods 
and goddesses ; I roll about in a chariot decorated 
with cupids, and look like the grandfather of 
Adonis. 

Of their parliaments and clergy I hear a good 
deal and attend very little ; I cannot take up any 
history in the middle, and was too sick of politics 
at home to enter into them here. In short, I have 
done with the world, and live in it rather than in 
a desert, like you. Few men can bear absolute 
retirement, and we English worst of all. We grow 
so humorsome, so obstinate and capricious, and so 
prejudiced, that it requires a fund of good-nature 
like yours not to grow morose.) Company keeps 
our rind from growing too coarse and rough ; and 
though at my return I design not to mix in public, 
I do not intend to be quite a recluse. My absence 
will put it in my power to take up or drop as much 
as I please. Adieu ! I shall inquire about your 
commission of books, but having been arrived but 
ten days have not yet had time. Need I say? — 
no, I need not — that nobody can be more affec- 
tionately yours than, etc. 



86 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

XXIII. 

VANITY OF COURT-HONORS. 

To Sir Horace Ma?m. 

Paris, Nov. 30, 1765. 

Allelujah, Monsieur l'Envoye ! I was going to 
direct to you by this title ; but if your credentials 
are not arrived, as I hope they are not, that I may 
be the first to notify your new dignity to you, I did 
not know how your new court would take it, and 
therefore I postpone your surprise till you have 
opened my letter, — if it loiters on the road like its 
predecessors, I shall be out of all patience. In 
short, my last express tells me that the King will 
name you Envoy in your new credentials. You 
must judge of the pleasure it gives me to have ob- 
tained this for you, my dear sir, by the vexation I 
expressed on thinking I could not effect it. All 
answer, I suppose, to my solicitations was deferred 
till I could be told they had succeeded. 

You must forget or erase most of what I had said 
to you lately, for when I can serve my friends I 
am content. Your letters had been so many and 
so earnest, and I so little expected any good from 
my intercession, that I was warmer than I wish I 
had been ; and the more, as I see I was in part un- 
just. I doubted everybody but Mr. Conway, and 
did not think that he alone had power to do what I 
desired, and could not bear you should think I ne- 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 87 

glected what I wished so much, pleasing you. I 
have done it to my great satisfaction, since it is what 
you had so much at heart ; but remember, I don't 
retract my sermon. I think exactly as I did, that 
one is in the wrong to place one's peace of mind 
on courts and honors : their joys are most moment- 
ary, violently overbalanced by disappointments, and 
empty in possession. I shall not excuse you if you 
have more of these solicitudes ; but I will rejoice 
with you over this one triumph, of which I will do you 
the justice to believe I am more glad than you are. 
You must thank Mr. Conway, by whom I obtained 
it, as if you owed it all to him. You know I hate 
to be talked of for these things, and therefore insist 
that my name be not mentioned to him or anybody 
but your brother. It will be the last favor I shall 
ever ask ; my constant plan has been to be nobody, 
and for the rest of my days I shall be more nobody 
than ever. You must gratify me with this silence. 
I did not think it would be necessary, or I should 
have made it a condition, for I have declared so 
much that I would meddle with nothing, that it 
would contradict those declarations, and disoblige 
some for whom I have refused to interest myself. 

As I grow better, I am more reconciled to this 
country; yet I shall return home in the spring. 
Apprehensions of the gout make one as old as the 
gout itself, and cure one of all prospects. I must 
resign that pleasing one, so long entertained, of seeing 
you at Florence. Your new establishment forbids 
my expecting you in England. Had I consulted 
my own wishes I should have let you have been 



S8 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

cross and come home ; happily I am not so selfish. 
I have learned, too, not to build on pleasures ; they 
are not of my age. I must go, and grow old, and 
bear ennui; must try to make comforts a recom- 
pense for living in a country where I do not love 
the people. My great spirits think all this a difficult 
task ; but spirits themselves are useless when one 
has not the same people to laugh with one as for- 
merly. I have no joy in new acquaintance, because 
I can have no confidence in them. Experience and 
time draw a line between older persons and younger 
which is never to be passed with satisfaction ; and 
though the whole bent of my mind was formed for 
youth, fortunately I know the ridicule of letting it 
last too long, and had rather act a part unnatural to 
me than a foolish one. I don't love acting a part 
at all — if I grow very tired of it I will return 
hither, and vary the scene ; this country is more 
favorable to latter age than England, and what a 
foreigner does is of no consequence anywhere. 
Adieu, my dear Envoy ! My letters lately seem 
very grave ; but analyze them, you will find them 
very foolish. 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 



XXIV. 

CONCERNING A PARTICULAR FRIEND, AND FRIEND- 
SHIP IN GENERAL. 

To Ja7>ies Crawford, Esq. 1 

Paris, March '6, 1766. 

You cannot conceive, my dear sir, how happy I 
was to receive your letters, not so much for my own 
sake as for Madame du Deffand's. I do not mean 
merely from the pleasure your letter gave her, but 
because it wipes off the reproaches she has under- 
gone on your account. They have at once twitted 
her with her partiality for you, and your indifference. 
Even that silly Madame de la Valiere has been quite 
rude to her on your subject. You will not be sur- 
prised ; you saw a good deal of their falsehood and 
spite, and I have seen much more. They have not 
only the faults common to the human heart, but that 
additional meanness and malice which is produced 
by an arbitrary Government, under which the sub- 
jects dare not look up to anything great., 

The King has just thunderstruck the Parliament, 
and they are all charmed with the thought that they 
are still to grovel at the foot of the throne ; but let 
us talk of something more meritorious. Your good 
old woman wept like a child with her poor no eyes 
as I read your letter to her. I did not wonder ; it 
is kind, friendly, delicate, and just, — so just that it 

1 The friend of Hume, commonly called Fish Crawford, on 
account of his curious and prying disposition. 



90 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

vexes me to be forced so continually to combat the 
goodness of her heart and destroy her fond visions 
of friendship. Ah ! but, said she at last, he does 
not talk of returning. I told her, if anything could 
bring you back, or me either, it would be desire of 
seeing her. I think so of you, and I am sure so of 
myself. If I had stayed here still, I have learned 
nothing but to know them more thoroughly. Their 
barbarity and injustice to our good old friend is in- 
describable : one of the worst is just dead, Madame 
de Lambert, — I am sure you will not regret her. 
Madame de Forcalquier, I agree with you, is the 
most sincere of her acquaintances, and incapable of 
doing as the rest do, — eat her suppers when they 
cannot go to a more fashionable house, laugh at her, 
abuse her, nay, try to raise her enemies among her 
nominal friends. They have succeeded so far as to 
make that unworthy old dotard, the President, treat 
her like a dog. Her nephew, the Archbishop of 
Toulouse, I see, is not a jot more attached to her 
than the rest, but I hope she does not perceive it so 
clearly as I do. Madame de Choiseul I really think 
wishes her well ; but perhaps I am partial. The 
Princess de Beauveau seems very cordial too, but I 
doubt the Prince a little. You will forgive these 
details about a person you love and have so much 
reason to love ; nor am I ashamed of interesting 
myself exceedingly about her. To say nothing of 
her extraordinary parts, she is certainly the most 
generous, friendly being upon earth ; but neither 
these qualities nor her unfortunate situation touch 
her unworthy acquaintance. Do you know that she 






LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 9 1 

was quite angry about the money you left for her 
servants? Viar would by no means touch it, and 
when I tried all I could to obtain her permission 
for their taking it, I prevailed so little that she gave 
Viar five louis for refusing it. So I shall bring you 
back your draft, and you will only owe me five louis, 
which I added to what you gave me to pay for the 
two pieces of china at Dulac's, which will be sent to 
England with mine. 

Well ! I have talked too long on Madame du 
Deffand, and neglected too long to thank you for 
my own letter : I do thank you for it, my dear sir, 
most heartily and sincerely. I feel all your worth 
and all the gratitude I ought, but I must preach to 
you as I do to your friend. Consider how little 
time you have known me, and what small opportuni- 
ties you have had of knowing my faults. I know 
them thoroughly ; but to keep your friendship within 
bounds, consider my heart is not like yours, young, 
good, warm, sincere, and impatient to bestow itself. 
(Mine is worn with the baseness, treachery, and 
mercenariness I have met with. It is suspicious, 
doubtful, and cooled. I consider everything round 
me but in the light of amusement, because if I 
looked at it seriously I should detest it. I laugh 
that I may not weep. I play with monkeys, dogs, 
or cats, that I may not be devoured by the beast 
of the Gevaudan. 1 I converse with Mesdames de 
Mirepoix, Boufflers, and Luxembourg, that I may 

1 A fierce animal resembling a wolf, which, after commit- 
ting great ravages on life and property, had finally been killed 
and placed on exhibition in the Queen's antechamber. 



92 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

not love Madame du Deffand too much ; and yet 
they do but make me love her the more. But don't 
love me, pray don't love me. (Old folks are but 
old women, who love their last lovers as much as 
they did their first. I should still be liable to be- 
lieve you, and I am not at all of Madame du Def- 
fand's opinion, that one might as well be dead as 
not love somebody. I think one had better be dead 
than love anybody. Let us compromise this matter ; 
you shall love her, since she likes to be loved, and 
I will be the confidant. We will do anything we 
can to please her. I can go no farther; I have 
taken the veil, and would not break my vow for the 
world. If you will converse with me through the 
grate at Strawberry Hill, I desire no better ; but not 
a word of friendship : I feel no more than if I pro- 
fessed it. It is paper credit, and like all other bank- 
bills, sure to be turned into money at last. I think 
you would not realize me ; but how do you, or how 
do I, know that I should be equally scrupulous? 
The Temple of Friendship, like the ruins in the 
Campo Vaccino, is reduced to a single column at 
Stowe. Those dear friends have hated one another 
till some of them are forced to love one another 
again; and as the cracks are soldered by hatred, 
perhaps that cement may hold them together. You 
see my opinion of friendship : it would be making 
you a fine present to offer you mine ! Your Minis- 
ters may not know it, but the war has been on the 
point of breaking out here between France and 
England, and upon a cause very English, — a horse- 
race. Lord Forbes and Lauragais were the cham- 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 93 

pions ; they rode, but the second lost. His horse 
being ill, it died that night, and the surgeons on 
opening it swore it was poisoned. The- English 
suspect that a groom, who I suppose had been 
reading Livy or Demosthenes, poisoned it on patri- 
otic principles, to ensure victory to his country. 
The French, on the contrary, think poison as 
common as oats or beans in the stables at New- 
market. In short, there is no impertinence they 
have not uttered, and it has gone so far that two 
nights ago it was said that the King had forbid- 
den another race, which is appointed for Monday, 
between the Prince de Nassau and a Mr. Forth, to 
prevent national animosities. On my side I have 
tried to stifle these heats, by threatening them that 
Mr. Pitt is coming into the Ministry again ; and it 
has had some effect. This event has confirmed 
what I discovered early after my arrival, that the 
Anglomanie was worn out ; if it remains, it is manie 
against the English. All this, however, is for your 
private ear; for I have found that some of my 
letters home, in which I had spoken a little freely, 
have been reported to do me disservice. As we 
are not friends, I may trust to your discretion — 
may not I ? I did not use to applaud it much. 

Perhaps it is necessary to use still more caution 
in mentioning me to Lord Ossory. Do it gently ; 
for though I have great regard for him, I don't 
design to make it troublesome to him. 

You don't say a word of our Duchess [Grafton], 
so superior to earthly Duchesses ! How dignified 
she will appear to me after all the little tracasseries 



94 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

of Paris ! I trust I shall see her soon. Packing-up 
is in all my quarters, but though I quit tittle-tattle, 
I don't design to head a squadron of mob on any 
side. I hate politics as much as friendship, and 
design to converse at home as I have done here, — 
with Devots, Philosophers, Choiseul, Maurepas, the 
Court, and the Temple. 

What a volume I have writ ! But don't be fright- 
ened : you need not answer it, if you have not a 
mind, for I shall be in England almost as soon as 
I could receive your reply. La Geoffiniska has 
received three sumptuous robes of ermine, martens 
and Astrakan lambs, the last of which the Czarina 
had, I suppose, the pleasure of flaying alive herself. 
" Oh ! pour cela, out,'" says old Brantome, who always 
assents. I think there is nothing else very new : 
Mr. Young puns, and Dr. Gem does not; Lorenzi 1 
blunders faster than one can repeat ; Voltaire writes 
volumes faster than they can print ; and I buy china 
faster than I can pay for it. I am glad to hear you 
hav? t> een tw0 or three times at my Lady Hervey's. 
By whl 1 - sne sa y s *" y° u > y° u ma > r ^ e comforted, 
though yoV 1 m i ss tne approbation of Madame de 
Valentinois. - -^ er g°lden apple, though indeed 
after all Paris h& gnawed it, is reserved for Lord 
Holdemesse! Adieu'; Yours ever. 

i Brother of Comte Lorenzi, the French minister at 
Florence. 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 95 

XXV. 

VISITS A WESLEY MEETING. 

To John Chute, Esq. 

Bath, Oct. 10, 1766. 

I am impatient to hear that your charity to me has 
not ended in the gout to yourself; all my comfort 
is, if you have it, that you have good Lady Brown to 
nurse you. 

My health advances faster than my amusement. 
However, I have been at one opera, Mr. Wesley's. 
They have boys and girls with charming voices, that 
sing hymns, in parts, to Scotch ballad-tunes ; but 
indeed so long that one would think they were al- 
ready in eternity, and knew how much time they 
had before them. The chapel is very neat, with true 
Gothic windows (yet I am not converted) ; but I 
was glad to see that luxury is creeping in upon them 
before persecution : they have very neat mahogany 
stands for branches, and brackets of the same in 
taste. At the upper end is a broad hautpas of four 
steps, advancing in the middle ; at each end of the 
broadest part are two of my eagles, with red cush- 
ions for the parson and clerk. Behind them rise 
three more steps, in the midst of which is a third 
eagle for pulpit, — scarlet-armed chairs to all three. 
On either hand, a balcony for elect ladies. The rest 
of the congregation sit on forms. Behind the pit, 
in a dark niche, is a plain table within rails, — so 
you see the throne is for the apostle. Wesley is a 



9 6 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

lean, elderly man, fresh- colored, his hair smoothly 
combed, but with a soupcon of curl at the ends ; 
wondrous clean, but as evidently an actor as Gar- 
rick. He spoke his sermon, but so fast and with 
so little accent that I am sure he has often uttered 
it, for it was like a lesson. There were parts and 
eloquence in it; but towards the end he exalted 
his voice and acted very ugly enthusiasm, — decried 
learning, and told stories, like Latimer, of the fool 
of his college, who said, " I thanks God for every- 
thing." Except a few from curiosity and some hon- 
orable women, the congregation was very mean. 
There was a Scotch Countess of Buchan, who is car- 
rying a pure rosy, vulgar face to heaven, and who 
asked Miss Rich if that was the author of the poets. 
I believe she meant me and the Noble Authors. 

The Bedfords came last night. Lord Chatham 
was with me yesterday two hours : looks and walks 
well, and is in excellent political spirits. 



XXVI. 

RESIGNING HIS SEAT IN PARLIAMENT. 

To William Langley, Esq., Mayor of Lynn. 

Arlington Street, March 13, 1767. 

Sir, — The declining state of my health and a 

wish of retiring from all public business have for 

some time made me think of not offering my service 

again to the town of Lynn as one of their represen- 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 97 

tatives in Parliament. I was even on the point, 
above eighteen months ago, of obtaining to have 
my seat vacated, by one of those temporary places 
often bestowed for that purpose • but I thought it 
more respectful, and more consonant to the great 
and singular obligations I have to the corporation 
and town of Lynn, to wait till I had executed their 
commands to the last hour of the commission they 
had voluntarily intrusted to me. 

Till then, sir, I did not think of making this dec- 
laration • but hearing that dissatisfaction and dissen- 
sions have arisen amongst you (of which I am so 
happy as to have been in no shape the cause), that 
a warm contest is expected, and dreading to see, in 
the uncorrupted town of Lynn, what has spread too 
fatally in other places, and what, I fear, will end in 
the ruin of this constitution and country, I think it 
my duty, by an early declaration, to endeavor to 
preserve the integrity and peace of so great, so re- 
spectable, and so unblemished a borough. 

My father was re-chosen by the free voice of Lynn 
when imprisoned and expelled by an arbitrary Court 
and prostitute Parliament ; and from affection to his 
name, not from the smallest merit in me, they unani- 
mously demanded me for their member while I was 
sitting for Castle-Rising. Gratitude exacts what in 
any other light might seem vainglorious in me to 
say ; but it is to the lasting honor of the town of 
Lynn I declare that I have represented them in two 
Parliaments without offering, or being asked, for the 
smallest gratification by any one of my constituents. 
May I be permitted, sir, to flatter myself they are 
7 



98 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

persuaded their otherwise unworthy representative 
has not disgraced so free and unbiassed a choice ?- v 

I have sat above five and twenty years in Parlia- 
ment ; and allow me to say, sir, as I am. in a man- 
ner, giving up my account to my constituents, that 
my conduct in Parliament has been as pure as my 
manner of coming thither. No man who is or has 
been Minister can say that I have ever asked or 
received a personal favor. My votes have neither 
been dictated by favor nor influence, but by the 
principles on which the Revolution was founded, the 
principles by which we enjoy the establishment of 
the present Royal Family, the principles to which 
the town of Lynn has ever adhered, and by which 
my father commenced and closed his venerable life. 
The best and only honors I desire would be to find 
that my conduct has been acceptable and satisfactory 
to my constituents. 

From your kindness, sir, I must entreat to have 
this notification made in the most respectful and 
grateful manner to the corporation and town of 
Lynn. Nothing can exceed the obligation I have 
to them but my sensibility to their favors ; and be 
assured, sir, that no terms can outgo the esteem I 
have for so upright and untainted a borough, or the 
affection I feel for all their goodness to my family 
and to me. My trifling services will be overpaid if 
they graciously accept my intention of promoting 
their union and preserving their virtue ; and though 
I may be forgotten, I never shall, or can, forget the 
obligations they have conferred on, sir, their and 
your most devoted, humble servant. 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 99 

XXVII. 

IN PARIS AGAIN WITH MADAME DU DETFAND. 

To George Montagu, Esq. 

Paris, Sept. 7, 1769. 
Your two letters flew here together in a breath. I 
shall answer the article of business first. I could 
certainly buy many things for you here that you 
would like, — the relics of the last age's magnifi- 
cence ; (but since my Lady Holdernesse invaded the 
Custom House with an hundred and fourteen gowns 
in the reign of that twopenny monarch, George 
Grenville, the ports are so guarded that not a soul 
but a smuggler can smuggle anything into England ; 
and I suppose you would not care to pay seventy- 
five per cent on second-hand commodities. All I 
transported three years ago was conveyed under the 
canon of the Duke of Richmond. I have no inter- 
est in our present representative, nor, if I had, is he 
returning. Plate, of all earthly vanities, is the most 
impassable : it is not contraband in its metallic ca- 
pacity, but totally so in its personal ; and the officers 
of the Custom House not being philosophers enough 
to separate the substance from the superficies, bru- 
tally hammer both to pieces, and return you only 
the intrinsic, — a compensation which you, who are 
no member of Parliament, would not, I trow, be sat- 
isfied with. Thus I doubt you must retrench your 
generosity to yourself, unless you can contract it into 



IOO LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

an Elzevir size, and be content with anything one 
can bring in one's pocket. 

My dear old friend [Madame du Deffand] was 
charmed with your mention of her, and made me 
vow to return you a thousand compliments. She 
cannot conceive why you will not step hither. Feel- 
ing in herself no difference between the spirits of 
twenty- three and seventy- three, she thinks there is 
no impediment to doing whatever one will, but the 
want of eyesight. If she had that, I am persuaded 
no consideration would prevent her making me a 
visit at Strawberry Hill. She makes songs, sings 
them, remembers all that ever were made ; and, 
having lived from the most agreeable to the most 
reasoning age, has all that was amiable in the last, 
all that is sensible in this, without the vanity of the 
former or the pedant impertinence of the latter. 
I have heard her dispute with all sorts of people on 
all sorts of subjects, and never knew her in the 
wrong. She humbles the learned, sets right their 
disciples, and finds conversation for everybody. Af- 
fectionate as Madame de Sevigne, she has none of 
her prejudices, but a more universal taste ; and with 
the most delicate frame, her spirits hurry her through 
a life of fatigue that would kill me if I was to con- 
tinue here. If we return by one in the morning 
from suppers in the country, she proposes driving 
to the Boulevard or to the Foire St. Ovide, because 
it is too early to go to bed ! I had great difficulty 
last night to persuade her, though she was not well, 
not to sit up till between two or three for the comet ; 
for which purpose she had appointed an astronomer 



LETTERS OF HORACE W ALP OLE. 101 

to bring his telescopes to the president Henault's, 
as she thought it would amuse me. In short, her 
goodness to me is so excessive that I feel una- 
shamed at producing my withered person in a round 
of diversions which I have quitted at home. I tell 
a story, — I do feel ashamed, and sigh to be in my 
quiet castle and cottage ; but it costs me many a 
pang when I reflect that I shall probably never have 
resolution enough to take another journey to see this 
best and sincerest of friends, who loves me as much 
as my mother did ! But it is idle to look forward. 
What is next year ? — a bubble that may burst for her 
or me, before even the flying year can hurry to the 
end of its almanac ! To form plans and projects in 
such a precarious life as this, resembles the en- 
chanted castles of fairy legends, in which every gate 
was guarded by giants, dragons, etc. Death or dis- 
eases bar every portal through which we mean to 
pass; and though we may escape them and reach 
the last chamber, what a wild adventurer is he that 
centres his hopes at the end of such an avenue ! I 
sit contented with the beggars at the threshold, and 
never propose going on but as the gates open of 
themselves. 

The weather here is quite sultry, and I am sorry 
to say one can send to the corner of the street and 
buy better peaches than all our expense in kitchen- 
gardens produces. Lord and Lady Dacre are a 
few doors from me, having started from Tunbridge 
more suddenly than I did from Strawberry Hill, 
but on a more unpleasant motive. My lord was 
persuaded to come and try a new physician. His 



102 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

faith is greater than mine ! But, poor man, can one 
wonder that he is willing to believe ? My lady has 
stood her shock, and I do not doubt will get 
over it. 

Adieu, my t 'other dear old friend ! I am sorry to 
say I see you almost as seldom as I do Madame du 
DefTand. However, it is comfortable to reflect that 
we have not changed to each other for some five 
and thirty years, and neither you nor I haggle 
about naming so ancient a term. I made a visit 
yesterday to the Abbess of Panthemont, General 
Oglethorpe's niece, and no chicken. I inquired 
after her mother, Madame de Mezieres, and thought 
I might, to a spiritual votary to immortality, venture 
to say that her mother must be very old ; she in- 
terrupted me tartly, and said no, her mother had 
been married extremely young. Do but think of 
its seeming important to a saint to sink a wrinkle 
of her own through an iron grate ! Oh, we are 
ridiculous animals ; and if angels have any fun in 
them, how we must divert them ! 



XXVIII. 

LITERARY AND DRAMATIC CRITICISM. 

To George Montagu, Esq, 

Strawberry Hill, Oct. 16, 1769. 
I arrived at my own Louvre last Wednesday 
night, and am now at my Versailles. Your last 
letter reached me but two days before I left Paris, 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 103 

for I have been an age at Calais and upon the sea. 
I could execute no commission for you, and in 
truth you gave me no explicit one ; but I have 
brought you a bit of china, and beg you will be 
content with a little present instead of a bargain. 
Said china is, or will be soon, in the Custom House ; 
but I shall have it, I fear, long before you come to 
London. 

I am sorry those boys got at my tragedy. 1 I beg 
you would keep it under lock and key ; it is not at 
all food for the public, — at least not till I am " food 
for worms, good Percy." Nay, it is not an age to 
encourage anybody, that has the least vanity, to 
step forth. There is a total extinction of all taste ; 
our authors are vulgar, gross, illiberal; the theatre 
swarms with wretched translations and ballad operas, 
and we have nothing new but improving abuse. I 
have blushed at Paris when the papers came over 
crammed with ribaldry or with Garrick's insuffer- 
able nonsense about Shakspeare. As that man's 
writings will be preserved by his name, who will be- 
lieve that he was a tolerable actor? Cibber wrote 
as bad Odes, but then Cibber wrote " The Careless 
Husband " and his own Life, which both deserve 
immortality. Garrick's prologues and epilogues 
are as bad as his Pindarics and Pantomimes. 

I feel myself here like a swan that, after living 
six weeks in a nasty pool upon a common, is got 
back into its own Thames. I do nothing but plume 
and clean myself, and enjoy the verdure and silent 

1 A party of schoolboys, visiting Montagu, had found 
Walpole's " The Mysterious Mother " and read it aloud. 



104 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

waves. Neatness and greenth are so essential in 
my opinion to the country, that in France, where I 
see nothing but chalk and dirty peasants, I seem in 
a terrestrial purgatory that is neither town nor 
country. The face of England is so beautiful that 
I do not believe Tempe or Arcadia were half so 
rural; for both, lying in hot climates, must have 
wanted the turf of our lawns. It is unfortunate to 
have so pastoral a taste, when I want a cane more 
than a crook. We are absurd creatures ; at twenty 
I loved nothing but London., 

Tell me when you shall be in town. I think of 
passing most of my time here till after Christmas. 
Adieu ! 



XXIX. 

GLOOMY VIEW OF CONTEMPORARY LITERATURE AND 
POLITICS. 

To the Hon. H. S. Conway. 

Strawberry Hill, Tuesday, Nov. 14, 1769. 
I am here quite alone, and did not think of 
going to town till Friday for the Opera, which I 
have not yet seen. In compliment to you and your 
countess, I will make an effort, and be there on 
Thursday, and will either dine with you at your own 
house or at your brother's, which you choose. 
This is a great favor, and beyond my Lord Temple's 
journey to dine with the Lord Mayor. 1 I am so 

1 In the second mayoralty of William Beckford. 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 105 

sick of the follies on all sides that I am happy to 
be at quiet here, and to know no more of them 
than what I am forced to see in the newspapers ; 
and those I skip over as fast as I can. 

The account you give me of Lady was just 

the same as I received from Paris. I will show you 
a very particular letter I received by a private hand 
from thence, which convinces me that I guessed 
right, contrary to all the wise, that the journey to 
Fontainebleau would overset Monsieur de Choiseul. 
I think he holds but by a thread, which will snap 
soon. 1 I am laboring hard with the Duchess of 
Choiseul to procure the Duke of Richmond satis- 
faction in the favor he has asked about his duchy 
[of Aubigne] ; but he shall not know it till it is 
completed, if I can be so lucky as to succeed. I 
think I shall if they do not fall immediately. 

You perceive how barren I am, and why I have 
not written to you. I pass my time in clipping and 
pasting prints, and do not think I have read forty 
pages since I came to England. I bought a poem 
called "Trinculo's Trip to the Jubilee," having been 
struck with two lines in an extract in the papers : 

" There the ear-piercing fife, 
And the ear-piercing wife." 

Alas ! all the rest, and it is very long, is a heap of 
unintelligible nonsense about Shakspeare, politics, 
and the Lord knows what. I am grieved that, with 
our admiration of Shakspeare, we can do nothing 

1 Alluding to some information he had received from 
Madame du Deffand. 



106 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

but write worse than ever he did. One would 
think the age studied nothing but his " Love's 
Labor's Lost" and " Titus Andronicus." Politics 
and abuse have totally corrupted our taste. No- 
body thinks of writing a line that is to last beyond 
the next fortnight. We might as well be given up 
to controversial divinity. The times put me in 
mind of the Constantinopolitan empire, where, in 
an age of learning, the subtlest wits of Greece con- 
trived to leave nothing behind them but the mem- 
ory of their follies and acrimony. Milton did not 
write his "Paradise Lost" till he had outlived his 
politics. With all his parts and noble sentiments 
of liberty, who would remember him for his bar- 
barous prose? Nothing is more true than that ex- 
tremes meet. The licentiousness of the Press makes 
us as savage as our Saxon ancestors who could only 
set their marks ; and an outrageous pursuit of in- 
dividual independence, grounded on selfish views, 
extinguishes genius as much as despotism does. 
The public good of our country is never thought of 
by men that hate half their country. Heroes con- 
fine their ambition to be leaders of the mob. Ora- 
tors seek applause from their faction, not from 
posterity ; and Ministers forget foreign enemies to 
defend themselves against a majority in Parliament. 
When any Caesar has conquered Gaul I will excuse 
him for aiming at the perpetual dictature. If he 
has only jockeyed somebody out of the borough of 
Veii or Falernum, it is too impudent to call himself 
a patriot or a statesman. Adieu ! 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 107 
XXX. 

IMPROVEMENTS AT STRAWBERRY HILL. 

To Sir Horace Mann. 

Strawberry "Bill, June 8, 1771. 

I do not believe that Orestes and Pylades were 
half so punctual correspondents for thirty years to- 
gether. But do not let us be content and stop here. 
Thirty years more will finish the century ; I have no 
objection to living so long l I hope you have none. 

You say I do not cite the dates of your letters ; 
but I did better, I executed your commission the in- 
stant I received it, and it is no fault of mine if Ma- 
dame Santini is not at this moment fanning herself 
with one of the fans. I should be inexcusable if I 
neglected the few commissions you give me, when 
you are so kindly punctual about mine. 

Mr. Chute, who dined here to-day, told me he 
had just heard that Lord Halifax is dead. It was 
hourly expected when I came from town on Thurs- 
day. Lord Suffolk was most talked of for his suc- 
cessor; and then the Privy Seal will be contested 
by two ex- Ministers, the Duke of Grafton and Lord 
Weymouth. 

I find you have been a great advocate for Le 
Fevre's medicine for the gout. He is already quite 
exploded here ; and about Liege, where he lives, 
they abhor him. He performs none of his promises 
but in producing an immediate fit, which can be 
done without a medicine. Mr. Chute and I are 



108 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

strong bootikinists. He, indeed, is a marvellous 
proof of their efficacy. He (so many years devoured 
by gout) has not had a fit in his feet these four 
years ; and when it comes in his hands, though it 
lasts very long, he never has three days of sharp 
pain. 

I do not know whether the Russian fleet will pass 
the Dardanelles, but their army must not pass the 
Danube. It is certain that Prince Lobkowitz was 
sent to Petersburg to make this declaration in the 
names of the Empress- Queen and Emperor ; and 
there is such a dearth of roubles in the other Em- 
press' treasury that she must stoop to the prohibi- 
tion. The peace itself would be made, yet as there 
is provision of money and troops made at Constan- 
tinople, the Sultan dares not but try another cam- 
paign, for fear of an insurrection. I like to see 
these haughty sovereigns obliged to draw in their 
talons, or put them forth, whether they will or not. 

Some of their representatives are to dine here to- 
morrow. Indeed, you ought to come too ; there 
will be a little co7'ps diplomatique, — the French, Span- 
ish, and Austrian Ministers. I am sorry this card 
cannot sail till Tuesday, when it will be too late. 
Seriously, how happy it would make me to see you 
here, salva your dignitate. Strawberry is in the most 
perfect beauty, the verdure exquisite, and the shades 
venerably extended. I have made a Gothic gateway 
to the garden, the piers of which are of artificial 
stone and very respectable. The Round Tower is 
finished, and magnificent, and the State Bedchamber 
proceeds fast ; for you must know the little villa is 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 109 

grown into a superb castle. We have dropped all 
humility in our style : yet, fond as I am of this 
place, I am going to leave it for some weeks, — in 
short, on another journey to Paris. Nothing, I think, 
but my dear old woman [Madame du Deffand] could 
draw me so far, and nothing but her shall I see. 
The time of year disculpates me from the scandalous 
surmise of going to divert myself. If the disturb- 
ances there should happen to amuse me, why that 
is excusable in an ancient politician; and no phi- 
losopher has forbidden our being entertained with 
public confusion. I shall, in truth, only look on 
with the same indifference with which I see our own 
squabbles. The latter are drawn to the dregs. I 
shall set out on the 7th of July, and be here again 
by the end of August. If you write to me in the 
interval, direct to London ; for you know we always 
have found more difficulty in sending our letters by 
the straight road than by that round-about. I shall 
probably write again before I go, though this is not 
a time of year when I can have much to tell you, 
and at present less than ever. 

Good night ! I reserve some paper, in case I 
should learn any European secrets from my guests 
to-morrow. 

Sunday Night. 

My party has succeeded to admiration, and Gothic 

architecture has received great applause. I will not 

swear that it has been really admired. I found by 

Monsieur de Guisnes that, though he had heard 



HO LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

much of the house, it was in no favorable light. He 
had been told it was only built of lath and plaster, 
and that there were not two rooms together on a 
level. When I once asked Madame du Deffand what 
her countrymen said of it, she owned they were not 
struck with it, but looked upon it as natural enough 
in a country which had not yet arrived at true 
taste. In short, I believe they think all the houses 
they see are Gothic, because they are not like that 
single pattern that reigns in every hotel in Paris, 
and which made me say there, that I never knew 
whether I was in the house that I was in, or in the 
house I came out of. Two or three rooms in a row, 
a naked salle-a-manger, a white-and-gold cabinet, 
with four looking-glasses, a lustre, a scrap of hanging 
over against the windows, and two rows of chairs, 
with no variety in the apartments, but from bigger 
to less, and more or less gilt, and a bed-chamber 
with a blue or red damask bed : this is that effort 
of taste to which they think we have not attained, — 
we who have as pure architecture and as classic taste 
as there was in Adrian's or Pliny's villas. Monsieur 
de Guisnes is very civil, and affects to like even our 
gardens ; though I can but doubt whether they do 
not use more of Nature's beauties than a Frenchman 
can be brought to feel. 

Lord Halifax died yesterday. The Bishop of 
Osnaburg is to have that ribbon to which the Earl 
had never been installed. As there is going to be 
an installation at the expense of the Crown, the 
Bishop's will be lumped with it, and save such an- 
other cost. Lord Hyde, they say, is to be Chan- 






LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. in 

cellor of the Duchy, in the room of Lord Strange, 
who died suddenly last week. I don't know how 
the greater places are to go. If I hear to-morrow, 
when I shall pass through London in my way to 
Lord Ossory's, I will tell you. 

Monday Night. 
It rains great places and preferments. The Bishop 
of Durham died last night ; but what is that to you 
or me ? You no more desire to be a right-reverend 
father in God than I to be Secretary of State. Yet 
how many are hankering after these things, without 
reflecting that they are more likely to follow in death 
than in succession ! It is excusable in children to 
cry for rattles, for they don't know how soon they 
are to part with them. I don't mean by this to give 
myself any preference in wisdom ; I have a house 
full of playthings, and am as fond of them as any 
bishop is of his bishopric. 



XXXI. 

ON THE DEATH OF THE POET GRAY. 
To the Rev. William Mason. 

Strawberry Hill, Sept. 25, 177 1. 
I have received both your letters, sir, by Mr. 
Stonhewer and by the post from York. I direct 
this to Aston rather than to York, for fear of any 
miscarriage, and will remember to insert, near 
Sheffield. 



112 LETTERS OF HORACE W ALT OLE. 

I not only agree with your sentiments, but am 
flattered that they countenance my own practice. 
In some cases I have sold my works, and some- 
times have made the impressions at my own press 
pay themselves, as I am not rich enough to treat 
the public with all I print there ; nor do I know 
why I should. Some editions have been given to 
charities, to the poor of Twickenham, etc. Mr. 
Spence's life of Magliabecchi was bestowed on the 
reading tailor. I am neither ashamed of being an 
author nor a bookseller. My mother's father was a 
timber-merchant. I have many reasons for thinking 
myself a worse man, and none for thinking myself 
better; consequently I shall never blush at doing 
anything he did. I print much better than I write, 
and love my trade, and hope I am not one of those 
most undeserving of all objects, printers and book- 
sellers, whom I confess you lash with justice. In 
short, sir, I have no notion of poor Mr. Gray's 
delicacy. I would not sell my talents as orators 
and senators do, but I would keep a shop, and sell 
any of my own works that would gain me a live- 
lihood, whether books or shoes, rather than be 
tempted to sell myself. 'T is an honest vocation to 
be a scavenger, but I would not be Solicitor-General. 
Whatever method you fix upon for the publication 
of Mr. Gray's works, I dare answer I shall approve, 
and will, therefore, say no more on it till we meet. 
I will beg you, sir, when you come to town to bring 
me what papers or letters he had preserved of 
mine ; for the answer to Dr. Milles, it is not worth 
asking you to accept or to take the trouble of bring- 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 113 

ing me, and therefore you may fling it aside where 
you please. 

The Epitaph 1 is very unworthy of the subject. I 
had rather anybody should correct my works than 
take the pains myself. I thank you very sincerely 
for criticising it, but indeed I believe you would 
with much less trouble write a new one than mend 
that. I abandon it cheerfully to the fire, for surely 
bad verses on a great poet are the worst of pane- 
gyrics. The sensation of the moment dictated the 
epitaph ; but though I was concerned, I was not in- 
spired. Your corrections of my play 2 I remember 
with the greatest gratitude, because I confess I liked 
it enough to wish it corrected, and for that friendly 
act, sir, I am obliged to you. For writing, I am 
quitting all thoughts of it ; and for several reasons, 
— the best is because it is time to remember that 
I must quit the world. Mr. Gray was but a year 
older, and he had much more the appearance of a 
man to whom several years were promised. A con- 
temporary's death is the Ucalegon of all sermons. 
In the next place his death has taught me another 
truth. Authors are said to labor for posterity ; for 
my part I find I did not write even for the rising 
generation. Experience tells me it was all for 
those of my own, or near my own, time. The 
friends I have lost were, I find, more than half the 
public to me. It is as difficult to write for young 

1 Walpole had written an Epitaph on Gray which Mason 
criticised for not sufficiently praising Gray's character as 
well as his poetical talents. 

2 The Mysterious Mother. 



114 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

people as to talk to them ; I never, I perceive, 
meant anything about them in what I have written, 
and cannot commence an acquaintance with them 
in print. 

Mr. Gray was far from an agreeable confidant to 
self-love, yet I had always more satisfaction in 
communicating anything to him, though sure to be 
mortified, than in being flattered by people whose 
judgment I do not respect. We had besides 
known each other's ideas from almost infancy, and 
I was certain he would understand precisely what- 
ever I said, whether it was well or ill expressed. 
This is a kind of feeling that every hour of age in- 
creases. Mr. Gray's death, I am persuaded, sir, 
has already given you this sensation, and I make no 
excuse for talking seemingly so much of myself ; but 
though I am the instance of these reflections, they 
are only part of the conversation which that sad 
event occasions, and which I trust we shall renew. 
I shall sincerely be a little consoled if our common 
regret draws us nearer together; you will find all 
possible esteem on my side : as there has been 
much similarity in some of our pursuits, it may 
make some amends for other defects. I have done 
with the business, the politics, the pleasures of the 
world, without turning hermit or morose. My 
object is to pass the remainder of my life tranquilly 
and agreeably, with all the amusements that will 
gild the evening and are not subject to disappoint- 
ment, with cheerfulness, for I have very good 
spirits, and with as much of the company as I can 
obtain of the few persons I value and like. If you 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 1 15 

have charity enough or inclination to contribute to 
such a system, you will add much to the happiness 
of it, and if you have not, you will still allow me to 
say I shall be ever, with great regard, sir, your obe- 
dient, humble servant. 



XXXII. 

DISASTER AT STRAWBERRY HILL. 

To the Countess of Ossory. 1 

Arlington Street, Jan. 5, 1772. 
Nothing but disasters, madam, since my last. 
Poor Mr. Fitzherbert hanged himself on Wednes- 
day. He went to see the convicts executed that 
morning, and from thence in his boots to his son, 
having sent his groom out of the way. At three 
his son said, " Sir, you are to dine at Mr. Buller's ; it 
is time for you to go home and dress." He went to 
his own stable and hanged himself with a bridle. 
They say his circumstances were in great disorder. 
There have been deep doings at Almack's, but no- 
body has retired into a stable. This paragraph, 
possibly, may be as old when you receive it as if it 
was in the magazine, for my letter will not set out 
till Thursday, as I cannot yet tell you the whole of 
a tragedy that happened to myself this very morn- 
ing — Don't be frightened, madam, I am not wind- 

1 The Duchess of Grafton, divorced from her first hus- 
band, had become Lady Ossory in 1769. 



n6 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

bound on the banks of Styx, and waiting to send 
back my letter by Charon. 

I was waked very early this morning, by half an 
hour after nine, — I mean this for flattery, for Mr. 
Crauford says your ladyship does not rise till one. 
By the way, I was in the middle of a charming dream. 
I thought I was in the King's Library in Paris, and 
in a gallery full of books of prints, containing nothing 
but fetes and decorations of scenery. I took down 
a long roll, on which was painted on vellum all the 
ceremonies of the present reign; there was the 
young King walking to his coronation : the Regent, 
before, who I thought was alive. I said to him : 
" Your royal Highness has a great air." He seemed 
extremely nattered, when the house shook as if the 
devil were come for him. I had scarce recovered 
my vexation at being so disturbed when the door 
of my room shook so violently that I thought some- 
body was breaking it open, though I knew it was not 
locked. It was broad daylight, but I did not know 
that housebreaking might not be still improving. I 
cried out, "Who is there?" Nobody answered. 
In less than another minute the door rattled and 
shook still more robberaceously. I called again ; no 
reply. I rang. The housemaid ran in as pale as 
white ashes, if you ever saw such, and cried, " Lud ! 
sir, I am frightened out of my wits ; there has been 
an earthquake ! " Oh ! I believed her immediately. 
Philip [his valet] came in, and being a Swiss phi- 
losopher, insisted it was only the wind. I sent him 
down to collect opinions in the street. He re- 
turned, and owned everybody in this and the 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 117 

neighboring streets were persuaded their houses had 
been breaking open, or had run out of them, think- 
ing there was an earthquake. Alas ! it was much 
worse ; for you know, madam, our earthquakes are 
as harmless as a new-born child. At one came in 
a courier from Margaret [his housekeeper] to tell 
me that five powder-mills had been blown up at 
Hounslow at half an hour after nine this morning, 
had almost shook Mrs. Clive, and had broken parts 
or all of eight of my painted windows, besides other 
damage. This is a cruel misfortune ; I don't know 
how I shall repair it ! I shall go down to-morrow, 
and on Thursday will finish my report. 

Wednesday, %th. 
Well, madam, I am returned from my poor 
shattered castle ; and never did it look so Gothic in 
its born days ! You would swear it had been be- 
sieged by the Presbyterians in the Civil Wars, and 
that, finding it impregnable, they had vented their 
holy malice on the painted glass. As this gun- 
powder-army passed on, it demolished Mr. Hindley's 
fine bow- window of ancient Scripture histories ; 
and only because your ladyship is my ally, broke 
the large window over your door and wrenched off 
a lock in your kitchen. Margaret sits by the 
waters of Babylon and weeps over Jerusalem. I 
shall pity those she shows the house to next sum- 
mer, for her story is as long and deplorable as a 
chapter of casualties in " Baker's Chronicle ; " yet 
she was not taken quite unprepared, for one of the 
bantam hens crowed on Sunday morning, and the 



Ii8 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

chandler's wife told her three weeks ago, when the 
barn was blown down, that ill-luck never comes 
single. She is, however, very thankful that the 
China Room has escaped, and says God has always 
been the best creature in the world to her. I dare 
not tell her how many churches I propose to rob to 
repair my losses. 



XXXIII. 

TRIBUTE TO GRAY'S GENIUS —DEPRECIATION OF 
GARRICK. 

To the Rev. William Cole. 

Arlington Street, Jan. 28, 1772. 

It is long, indeed, dear sir, since we corres- 
ponded. I should not have been silent if I had 
anything worth telling you in your way ; but I grow 
such an antiquity myself that I think I am less fond 
of what remains of our predecessors. 

I thank you for Bannerman's 1 proposal, — I mean, 
for taking the trouble to send it ; for I am not at all 
disposed to subscribe. I thank you more for the 
note on King Edward, — I mean, too, for your friend- 
ship in thinking of me. Of Dean Milles I cannot 
trouble myself to think any more. His piece is at 
Strawberry : perhaps I may look at it for the sake 
of your note. The bad weather keeps me in town 
and a good deal at home, which I find very com- 
1 The engraver of some of Walpole's works. 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 119 

fortable, literally practising what so many persons 
pretend they intend, — being quiet and enjoying my 
fireside in my elderly days. 

Mr. Mason has shown me the relics of poor Mr. 
Gray. I am sadly disappointed at finding them so 
very inconsiderable. He always persisted, when I 
inquired about his writings, that he had nothing by 
him. I own I doubted. I am grieved he was so 
very near exact, — I speak of my own satisfaction ; 
as to his genius, what he published during his life 
will establish his fame as long as our language lasts 
and there is a man of genius left. There is a silly 
fellow, I don't know who, that has published a vol- 
ume of Letters on the English Nation, with char- 
acters of our modern authors. He has talked such 
nonsense on Mr. Gray that I have no patience with 
the compliments he has paid me. He must have 
an excellent taste ! and gives me a woful opinion of 
my own trifles, when he likes them, and cannot see 
the beauties of a poet that ought to be ranked in 
the first line. 

I am more humbled by any applause in the 
present age than by hosts of such critics as Dean 
Milles. Is not Garrick reckoned a tolerable actor? 
His " Cymon," his prologues and epilogues, and forty 
such pieces of trash, are below mediocrity, and yet 
delight the mob in the boxes as well as in the foot- 
man's gallery. I do not mention the things written 
in his praise, because he writes most of them him- 
self. 1 But you know any one popular merit can 

1 Mrs. Garrick is reported to have said to a friend : " Why 
do you not write your own criticisms ? Davy always does." 



120 LETTERS- OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

confer all merit. -Two women talking of Wilkes, 
one said he squinted ; t 'other replied, " Squints ! 
— well, if he does, it is not more than a man should 
squint." For my part, I can see how extremely 
well Garrick acts, without thinking him six feet high. 
It is said Shakspeare was a bad actor : why do not 
his divine plays make our wise judges conclude that 
he was a good one ? They have not a proof of the 
contrary, as they have in Garrick' s works. But what 
is it to you or me what he is? We may see him 
act with pleasure, and nothing obliges us to read his 
writings. 1 



XXXIV. 

SELECTION OF GRAY'S LETTERS FOR PUBLICATION. 

To the Rev. William Mason. 

Strawberry Hill, May g, 1772- 
I have given up to Mr. Stonhewer, as you desired, 
dear sir, Mr. Gray's volume of MSS., but shall be 
glad hereafter, if you do not dislike it. to print some 
of the most curious. He himself was to lend me 
the speech and letters of Sir Thomas Wyat. At a 
leisure hour, would not it be amusing to you to draw 
up a little account of that Poet? 

Dr. Brown 2 has sent me a very civil letter of 

1 Walpole shows a singular lack of appreciation of Gar- 
rick, both as writer and actor, on the many occasions in 
which his name is mentioned throughout his correspondence. 

2 Master of Pembroke College. 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 121 

thanks for Gray's portrait. He speaks too of the 
book I intended for their college, and that he was 
to receive from you. I forget whether I troubled 
you with it or not. 

I have selected for your use such of Gray's letters 
as will be intelligible without many notes ; but 
though all his early letters have both wit and humor, 
they are so local, or so confined to private persons, 
and stories, that it would be difficult, even by the 
help of a comment, to make them interesting to the 
public. Some of the incidents alluded to have 
slipped out of my own memory; still, there are 
about twenty of his juvenile letters that I think will 
please. I will bring them with me when I make 
you a visit in August. I have a great many more, 
to the very end of his life ; but they are grave, and 
chiefly relative to questions in antiquity on which I 
consulted him, or begged him to consult the libraries 
at Cambridge. There are some criticisms on modern 
books and authors, either his own opinions or in 
answer to mine. These are certainly not proper for 
present publication ; but I shall leave these and the 
rest behind me, and none of them will disgrace him, 
— which ought to be our care, since it was so very 
much his own. 

Mr. Palgrave is in town, and has promised to pass 
a day with me here, where I am continuing my im- 
mortal labors with those durable materials, painted 
glass and carved wood and stone. The foundations 
of the chapel in the garden are to be dug on 
Monday. The state-bedchamber advances rapidly, 
and will, I hope, be finished before my journey to 



122 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

Yorkshire. In short, this old, old, very old castle, as 
his prints called Old Parr, is so near being perfect 
that it will certainly be ready, by the time I die, to 
be improved with Indian paper, or to have the 
windows cut down to the ground by some travelled 
lady. 

The newspapers tell me that Mr. Chambers, the 
architect, who has Sir-Williamised himself by the 
desire, as he says, of the knights of the Polar Star, 
his brethren, who were angry at his not assuming 
his proper title, is going to publish a treatise on 
Ornamental Gardening ; that is, I suppose, consid- 
ering a garden as a subject to be built upon. In 
that light it will not interfere with your verses or my 
prose ; 1 and we may both use the happiest expression 
in the world and 

" Coldly declare him free." 

In truth our climate is so bad that instead of 
filling our gardens with buildings, we ought rather to 
fill our buildings with gardens, as the only way of 
enjoying the latter. 

" The dreaded East is all the wind that blows ; " 

and yet I am afraid to rail at it, lest the rain 
should make advantage of my plaints, and come and 
drown us till the end of July. I was lamenting the 
weather to M. de Guisnes, the French ambassador. 
He said, " In England you talk of nothing but the 
bad weather; I wonder you are not used to it." 
Yet one must have seen such a thing as spring, or 

1 That is, Mason's English Garden, and Walpole's Essay 
on Modern Gardening. 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 123 

one could not have invented the idea. I can swear 
to have formerly heard nightingales as I have been 
sitting in this very bow-window. If I was thirty 
years younger, I might fancy they are gone because 
Phcebe is gone ; but I have certainly heard them 
long since my ballad-making days. I hope your 
garden, which is not exposed to wayward seasons, 
but 

" Will always flourish in immortal youth," 

advances a great pace. Consider, you are to record 
what it was when fashion and great lords shall have 
brought back square enclosures, walls, terraces, and 
labyrinths, and shall be told by the Le Nautre of the 
day that their lordships have invented a new taste, 
and will never know to the contrary ; for though 
beautiful poems preserve themselves, it is not by 
being read and known. Works of genius are like the 
Hermetic philosophers, — none but adepts are ac- 
quainted with their existence ; yet certainly nothing 
is ever lost, — as you may find in Mr. Warton's new 
Life of Sir Thomas Pope, which has resuscitated 
more nothings and more nobodies than Birch's 
Life of Tillotson or Lowth's William of Wykeham. 

There has been a Masquerade at the Pantheon, 
which was so glorious a vision that I thought I was 
in the old Pantheon, or in the temples of Delphi 
or Ephesus amidst a crowd of various nations, and 
that formerly 

" Panthoi'des Euphorbus eram," 

and did but recollect what I had seen. All the 
friezes and niches were edged with alternate lamps 



124 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

of green and purple glass that shed a most heathen 
light, and the dome was illuminated by a heaven of 
oiled paper well painted with gods and goddesses. 
Mr. Wyat, the architect, has so much taste that I 
think he must be descended from Sir Thomas. 
Even Henry VIII. had so much taste that were he 
alive he would visit the Pantheon. Adieu, dear 
sir ! Yours most sincerely. 



XXXV. 

RUIN AND DESOLATION OF THE FAMILY PROPERTY. 

To the Hon. H. S. Conway. 

Arlington Street, Aug. 30, 1773. 
I returned last night from Houghton, 1 where 
multiplicity of business detained me four days longer 
than I intended, and where I found a scene infinitely 
more mortifying than I expected ; though I certainly 
did not go with a prospect of finding a land flowing 
with milk and honey. Except the pictures, which 
are in the finest preservation, and the woods, which 
are become forests, all the rest is ruin, desolation, 
confusion, disorder, debts, mortgages, sales, pillage, 
villany, waste, folly, and madness. I do not believe 
that five thousand pounds would put the house and 
buildings into good repair. The nettles and bram- 
bles in the park are up to your shoulders ; horses 
have been turned into the garden, and banditti 

1 Having gone to look after affairs during one of his 
nephew's fits of insanity. 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 125 

lodged in every cottage. The perpetuity of livings 
that come up to the park-pales have been sold, 
and every farm let for half its value. In short, you 
know how much family pride I have, and conse- 
quently may judge how much I have been mortified. 
Nor do I tell you half, or near the worst circum- 
stances. I have just stopped the torrent, and that 
is all. I am very uncertain whether I must not fling 
up the trust. And some of the difficulties in my 
way seem insurmountable, and too dangerous not 
to alarm even my zeal ; since I must not ^ruin my- 
self, and hurt those for whom I must feel, too, only 
to restore a family that will end with myself, and to 
retrieve an estate from which I am not likely ever 
to receive the least advantage. 

If you will settle with the Churchills your journey 
to Chalfont, and will let me know the day, I will 
endeavor to meet you there ; I hope it will not be 
till next week. I am overwhelmed with business — 
but, indeed, I know not when I shall be otherwise. 
I wish you joy of this endless summer. 



XXXVI. 

ON A PERFORMANCE OF MASON'S " ELFRIDA." 

To the Rev. William Mason. 

Arlington Street, Nov. 19, 1773. 
I know nothing of you ; you have left me off. I 
know you are alive, for Lord Strafford has seen you 
twice. Yet it is plain I am not out of charity with 



126 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

you, for I have been to see " Elfrida " [at Covent 
Garden] ; think it was out of revenge, though it 
is wretchedly acted, and worse set to music. The 
virgins were so inarticulate that I should have un- 
derstood them as well if they had sung choruses 
of Sophocles. Orgar had a broad Irish accent ; I 
thought the First Virgin, who is a lusty virago, called 
Miss Miller, would have knocked him down, and I 
hoped she would. Edgar stared at his own crown, 
and seemed to fear it would tumble off. Smith did 
not play Athelwold ill. Mrs. Hartley is made for the 
part, if beauty and figure could suffice for what you 
write ; but she has no one symptom of genius. Still 
it was very affecting, and does admirably for the 
stage under all these disadvantages. The tears 
came into my eyes, and streamed down the Duchess 
of Richmond's lovely cheeks. 

Mr. Garrick has been wondrously jealous of the 
King's going twice together to Covent Garden ; and 
to lure him back, has crammed the town's maw with 
shows of the Portsmouth Review, and interlarded 
every play with the most fulsome loyalties. He has 
new-written the " Fair Quaker of Deal," and made 
it ten times worse than it was originally ; and all to 
the tune of Portsmouth and George forever ! not to 
mention a preface in which the Earl of Sandwich 
by name is preferred to Drake, Blake, and all the 
admirals that ever existed. 

Dr. Hawkesworth is dead, — out of luck not to 
have died a twelvemonth ago. 

Lady Holdernesse has narrowly escaped with her 
life ; she fell on the top of the stairs at Sion against 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 127 

the edge of a door, which cut such a gash on her 
temple that they were forced to sew it up, — it was 
within half an inch of her eye, which is black all 
round, but not hurt ; and her knee was much bruised. 
This good town affords no other news, and is de- 
solate, — not that I make you any apologies for being 
so brief. I have ten times more business than you, 
and millions of letters of business; and sure you 
might always find as much to say as I had now. 



XXXVII. 

GARRICK'S "CHRISTMAS TALE." — IN PRAISE OF MUSIC. 

To the Countess of Ossory. 

Arlington Street, Jan. 5, 1774. 
The physicians continue to flatter us with the fair- 
est hopes of Lord Orford's recovery ; yet I am far 
from seeing any solid ground to build on. He per- 
sists in only whispering, is impatient of all contradic- 
tion, cannot without authority be kept from wine, 
thinks of nothing but his dogs and horses, and the 
physicians themselves are afraid of telling him they 
are gone. My anxiety, instead of being lessened, is 
doubled. I dare not contradict the faculty, who, I 
fear, have been rash. I dread a relapse ; I dread 
still more the consequences of a sudden release. 
The physicians have said he is so well that all his 
acquaintance are pouring in upon him ; and yet I 
am told I must keep him quiet and admit nobody. 



128 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

My whole time is employed in sending messages to 
his house ; while every one gives me different advice, 
and expects I should attend to every contrariety. 
But though you are so very kind, madam, as to in- 
terest yourself in my perplexed and grievous situa- 
tion, ought I to weary you with the circumstances ? 
Any other subject is preferable ; but I have no news, 
and if I spin out of my own bowels, what can I find 
there but the poison I have been swallowing these 
eight months? 

The character of Lord Chatham was written by 
the Irish Mr. Flood, 1 and published in Dublin a 
year ago in a book called " Baratariana." Indeed 
there was little probability of its being the work of 
Dr. Robertson. Could so much truth come out of 
Nazareth ? 

The play at Cashiobury is much vaunted, both for 
acting and magnificence. Mr. Cradock, 2 author of 
a bad tragedy called " Zobeide," was introduced be- 
tween the acts to repeat Gray's Eton " Ode." It is 
a pity Sir Ralph Pain was not here to pronounce an 
oration of Demosthenes or Hurlothrumbo. I have 
seen the " Christmas Tale ; " it is a due mixture of 
opera, tragedy, comedy, and pantomime, with beau- 
tiful scenes. This effort of genius is, among others, 
given to me. One of the penalties one pays for 
having played the fool, is to be suspected of being 
a greater fool and oftener than one is. Not that I 
complain, for I am a considerable gainer on the bal- 
ance of false reputation. If the " School for Wives " 

1 An error ; written by Mr. Grattan. 

2 The friend of Goldsmith and Johnson. 



LETTERS OF HORACE W A LP OLE. 129 

and the " Christmas Tale " were laid to me, so was 
"The Heroic Epistle." I could certainly have writ- 
ten the two former, but not the latter. Both show 
for what judges men become authors. I daresay 
the Heroic bard is as much offended at being con- 
founded with me as I am with the others, and with 
more reason. Mediocrity is much nearer to the bot- 
tom than to the top ; but here am I talking of com- 
mon writers when I can tell you of a noble one 
to be enrolled in my Catalogue. The present Lord 
Granby is an author, and has written a poem on 
" Charity," and in prose a " Modest Apology for Adul- 
tery." I am even assured they have been printed and 
published ; I much doubt the latter, but have em- 
ployed emissaries to find out the truth. They say 
his lordship writes in concert with a very clever 
young man whose name I have forgotten. 

I condole for your loss of the Graces 1 and the 
breaking up of your Academy. Methinks I wish 
Lord Ossory would employ Sir Joshua on a large pic- 
ture like Rubens in the Luxembourg. Lady Anne's 
education will certainly turn out better than that of 
Mary de' Medici. You must hold her in your lap : 
our lord, like Mercury, introduces the three Vernons, 
and with so much truth, you would not want alle- 
gory, which I do not love. You will stare at a 
strange notion of mine : if it appears even a mad 
one, do not wonder. Had I children, my utmost 
endeavors should be to breed them musicians. Con- 
sidering I have no ear, nor ever thought of music, 

1 The three Misses Vernon, whom Walpole had addressed 
in a poem as " The Three Graces." 
9 



130 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

the preference seems odd; and yet it is embraced 
on frequent reflection. In short, madam, as my aim 
would be to make them happy, I think it the most 
probable method. It is a resource will last their 
lives, unless they grow deaf; it depends on them- 
selves, not on others ; always amuses and soothes, if 
not consoles; and of all fashionable pleasures is 
the cheapest. It is capable of fame, without the 
danger of criticism; is susceptible of enthusiasm, 
without being priest-ridden ; and unlike other mortal 
passions, is sure of being gratified, even in heaven. 



XXXVIII. 

TRIBUTE TO MASON AS EDITOR AND AUTHOR.— 
CONCERNING SLAVERY IN AMERICA. 

To the Rev. Willia?n Mason. 

Feb. 14, 1774. 
I am most impatient for your Lyric section and 
the completion of the Ode. Nay, I am glad to 
have lost so much of schoolboy and schoolmaster 
as to be charmed with the Fragment, though Dr. 
Barnard frowns on it. Pray remember, however, 
that when you have so much piety for Mr. Gray's 
remains, you are unpardonable in leaving your own 
works imperfect. I trust, as you will now enjoy 
your own garden in summer and will have finished 
the Life by your return from York, that you will 
perfect your " Essay on Modern Gardening; " you 

1 Master at Eton. 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 131 

have given a whole year to your friend, and are in 
debt to the public. 

My troubles are at an end, my nephew is as well 
as ever He was, and is gone into the country either 
to complete his own ruin and his family's, or to 
relapse. I shall feel the former, I dread the latter ; 
but I must decline the charge a second time. It 
half killed me, and would entirely have ruined my 
health. Indeed it has hurt me so much that 
though my mind has recovered its tranquillity, I 
cannot yet shake off the impressions and recall 
my spirits. Six months of gout and nine of stew- 
ardship and fears were too much for my time of 
life and want of strength. The villany too that I 
have seen has shocked me ; and memory predom- 
inates over cheerfulness. My inclination will cer- 
tainly carry me this summer into Yorkshire, if dread 
of my biennial gout does not restrain me. Some- 
times I have a mind to go to a warmer climate ; 
but either at Aston or at Strawberry will insist on 
our meeting before winter. What signifies a neigh- 
bor 1 you do not wish to see ? Are our enemies to 
deprive us of our best satisfaction, — seeing our 
friends? I will presume to say you cannot have a 
warmer or more sincere one than myself, who never 
call myself so when I do not feel myself so, and 
who have few pleasures left but that of saying what 
I think. You are too wise and too good not to 
despise the dirtiness of fools, or to regret a man 
who came to years of discretion before he was 

1 Alluding to Lord Holdernesse, who lived near Straw- 
berry, and was disliked by Mason. 



132 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

past his childhood, and is superannuated before he 
is come to his understanding. He is decaying fast, 
and will soon exist but in his epitaph, like those 
poor Knights of Windsor who are recorded on their 
gravestones for their loyalty to Charles I. 

The House of Lords is busy on the question of 
Literary Property, — a question that lies between the 
integrity of Scotch authors and English booksellers. 
The other House has got into a new scrape with 
the City and printers, which I suppose will end to 
the detriment of the press. The Ministers have a 
much tougher business on their hand, in which 
even their factotum the Parliament may not be 
able to insure success, — I mean the rupture with 
America. If all the black slaves were in rebellion, 
I should have no doubt in choosing my side ; but I 
scarce wish perfect freedom to merchants who are 
the bloodiest of all tyrants. I should think the 
souls of the Africans would sit heavy on the swords 
of the Americans. 

We are still expecting the Works of Lord Ches- 
terfield and Lord Lyttelton, — on my part with no 
manner of impatience : one was an ape of the 
French, the other of the Greeks ; and I like neither 
second-hand pertness nor solemnity. There is pub- 
lished a " Postscript " to the " Heroic Epistle," cer- 
tainly by the same author, 1 as is evident by some 
charming lines, but inferior to the former, as second 
parts are apt to be. The History of Charles Fox 
and Mrs. Grieve is come out too in rhyme, wretch- 
edly done, but minutely true. I think I have told 
1 Mason himself. 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 133 

you all I know, and more than you will care whether 
you know or not. (it is an insipid age. J Even the 
Maccaronis degenerate ; they have lost all their 
money and credit, and ruin nobody but their tailors. 
Adieu. 



XXXIX. 

HOUGHTON AND LAWYERS. —LITERARY PROPERTY. 

To the Rev. William Mason. 

Strawberry Hill, March 23, 1774. 
Dear Sir, — I wrote my last in a great hurry, 
and not much knowing what I said, being just 
lighted from my chaise after being a fortnight at 
Houghton with my nephew, where my head was 
filled with business, and my heart with anxiety and 
grief and twenty other passions, for (not to return 
to the subject) if he is recovered I doubt it will not 
be for a long season. He is neither temperate in 
his regimen nor conduct, and if I have chased away 
seven evil spirits, as many are ready to enter. In 
short, the rest of my life, I find, and they will shorten 
it, is to be spent in contests with lawyers, the worst 
sort of lawyers, attorneys, stewards, farmers, mort- 
gagees, and toad-eaters. I do not advance, and 
cannot retreat. I wished to live only for my friends 
and myself; I must now, I find, live for my rela- 
tions — or die for them. You are very kind in pity- 
ing, and advising me to consult my ease and health ; 
but if you knew my whole story, and it was not too 
long, even for a series of letters like Clarissa's, you 



134 LETTERS OE HORACE WALPOLE. 

would encourage me to proceed. For I natter my- 
self that my duty is the incentive to my conduct, and 
you, whose life is blameless, would, I am sure, advise 
your friend to sacrifice his happiness at last to his 
family, and to the memory of a father to whom he 
owes everything. But no more on this, though it 
has, and does occupy my mind so much that I am 
absolutely ignorant of the affairs of the world, and 
of all political and literary news, though the latter 
are the only comforts of the few moments I have 
to myself. 

I began Mr. Bryant's — what shall I call it? — 
pre-existent " History of the World," but had not 
time to finish the first volume. It put me in mind 
of Prior's Madam, who — 

"To cut things, came down to Adam." 

There are two pages under the Radical Macar that 
will divert you, — an absolute account of MaKapcoves, 
though I dare to swear the good man never dreamed 
that he was writing the history of Almack's. I have 
just got Mr. Warton's "Life of Poetry," and it 
seems delightfully full of things I love, but not a 
minute to begin it ; nor Campbell's long-expected 
work on Commerce, which he told me, twenty years 
ago, should be the basis on which he meant to build 
his reputation. Lord Lyttelton and Lord Chester- 
field are coming forth, and one must run them over 
in self-defence. Still I say to you, O quando ego te 
aspiciam — yes, Te, both you and your Gray ! I 
am impatient for the remainder, though I would not 
have it hurried. 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 135 

Mr. Stonhewer will have told you what I said on 
the print [of Gray] ; but if he could make sense 
of it I shall wonder, for I was on both sides : for 
your print, as the more agreeable ; for Wilson's pic- 
ture as extremely like, though a likeness that shocks 
one. There are marks, evident marks, of its being 
painted after Gray's death ; I would not hang it 
up in my house for the world. I think I am now 
come to know my own mind : it is to have prints 
of both, — from yours at the beginning to front his 
Juvenilia ; from Wilson's, at or towards the end, as 
the exact representation of him in his last years of 
life. The delay will not signify, as your book is a 
lasting one, — no matter if it comes out in the mid- 
dle of summer. It does not depend for its sale on 
a full London : it will be sent for into the country, 
and will always continue to be sold. Were I to 
write anything that I could hope to have minded, 
I would publish in summer. The first ball, duel, 
divorce, new prologue of Garrick, or debate in the 
House of Commons, makes everything forgotten in 
a minute in winter. W T edderburn's philippic on 
Franklin, that was cried up to the skies, Chief Jus- 
tice de Grey's on Literary Property, Lord Sandwich's 
honorable behavior to Miller the printer, are already 
at the bottom of Lethe. Mademoiselle Heinel 
dances to-morrow, and Wedderburn and Lord Sand- 
wich will catch their deaths if they wait in either 
of the Temples of Fame or Infamy in expectation 
of admirers. 

I know not a word more than I told you, or you 
have heard, of the affair of Literary Property. Lord 



136 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

Mansfield's finesse, as you call it, was christened by 
its true names, — pitiful and paltry. Poor Mrs. Ma- 
caulay has written a very bad pamphlet on the sub- 
ject. It marks dejection and sickness. In truth, 
anybody that has principles must feel. Half of the 
King's Opposition at least are hurrying to Court. 
Sir William Meredith has ridden thither on a white 
stick; Colonel Barre" on the necks of the Bosto- 
nians, his old friends ; Mr. Burke, who has a toler- 
able stake in St. Vincent's, seems to think it worth 
all the rest of America. Still, I do not know how, 
an amazing bill of an amazing parent has slipped 
through the ten thousand fingers of venality, and 
gives the Constitution some chance of rousing itself, 
— I mean Grenville's bill for trying Elections. It 
passed as rapidly as if it had been for a repeal of 
Magna Charta, brought in by Mr. Cofferer Dyson. 
Well ! it is one o'clock in the morning, and I must 
go to bed. I have passed one calm evening here 
alone, and have concluded it most agreeably by 
chatting with you. To-morrow I must return into 
the bustle ; but I carry everywhere with me the 
melancholy impression of my life's tranquillity being 
at an end. I see no prospect of peace for me, 
whether my nephew lives, dies, relapses, or remains 
as he is at present. I love to be occupied, but in 
my own way, unobserved and unconnected. My 
joy is to read or write what I please, — not letters of 
business, accounts or applications. But good night ; 
I have tired you and myself: my sole excuse is, if 
you will take it for one, that I had other things to 
do that I should have liked doing ; but writing to 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 137 

you was the greatest pleasure, and according to 
my former habits I preferred what amused me 
best. 



XL. 

INDUCEMENTS TO VISIT STRAWBERRY HILL. 

To Rev. William Cole. 

Arlington Street, May \, 1774. 
Dear Sir, — We have dropped one another, as 
if we were not antiquaries, but people of this world 
— or do you disclaim me, because I have quitted 
the Society? I could give you but two sad reasons 
for my silence. The gout kept entire possession of 
me for six months ; and before it released me, Lord 
Orford's illness and affairs engrossed me totally. I 
have been twice in Norfolk since you heard from me. 
I am now at liberty again. What is your account of 
yourself? To ask you to come above ground, even 
so far as to see me, I know is in vain, or I certainly 
would ask it. You impose Carthusian shackles on 
yourself, will not quit your cell, nor will speak above 
once a week. I am glad even to hear of you, and 
to see your hand, though you make that as much 
like print as you can. If you were to be tempted 
abroad, it would be a pilgrimage ; and I can lure 
you even with that. My Chapel is finished, and the 
shrine will actually be placed in less than a fortnight. 
fMy father is said to have said that every man had 
his priced You are a Beatus indeed if you resist a 
shrine. Why should not you add to your claustral 



138 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

virtues that of a peregrination to Strawberry? You 
will find me quite alone in July. Consider, Straw- 
berry is almost the last monastery left, at least in 
England. Poor Mr. Bateman's is despoiled. Lord 
Bateman has stripped and plundered it ; has seques- 
tered the best things, has advertised the site, and is 
dirtily selling by auction what he neither would keep, 
nor sell for a sum that is worth while. I was hurt to 
see half the ornaments of the chapel, and the reli- 
quaries, and in short a thousand trifles, exposed to 
sneers. I am buying a few to keep for the founder's 
sake. Surely it is very indecent for a favorite rela- 
tion, who is rich, to show so little remembrance and 
affection. I suppose Strawberry will have the same 
fate. It has already happened to two of my friends. 
Lord Bristol got his mother's house from his brother 
[Augustus], by persuading her he was in love with 
it. He let it in a month after she was dead ; and all 
her favorite pictures and ornaments, which she had 
ordered not to be removed, are mouldering in a 
garret ! 

You are in the right to care so little for a world 
where there is no measure but avoirdupois. Adieu ! 
Yours sincerely. 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 139 



XLI. 

DEGENERATION OF THE PRESENT TIME. — 
PLEASURES OF OLD AGE. 

To the Rev. William Mason. 

Excuse me, but I cannot take your advice, nor 
intend to print any more for the public. When I 
offer you my press it is most selfishly, and to possess 
your writings, for I would only print a few copies for 
your friends and mine. My last volume of the 
"Anecdotes of Painting" has long been finished, 
and as a debt shall some time or other be published ; 
but there I take my leave of Messieurs the readers. 
Let Dr. Johnson please this age with the fustian of 
his style and the meanness of his spirit ; both are 
good and great enough for the taste and practice pre- 
dominant. I think this country sinking fast into ruin ; 
and when it is become an absolute monarchy, and 
thence insignificant, I do not desire to be remem- 
bered by slaves, and in a French province. I would 
not be Virgil or Boileau on such conditions. Present 
amusement is all my object in reading, writing, or 
printing. To gratify the first especially, I wish to 
see your poem finished, — 

" You, who erewhile the happy garden sung, 

Continue to sing 

Recovered Paradise ! . . . " 

I am less impatient for Gray's Life, being sure of 
seeing it, whether published or not ; and as I con- 



140 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

elude neither his letters nor Latin poems will be 
admired to the height they deserve, I am jealous of 
his fame, and do not like its being cast before 
swine. In short, I wish his and your writings to 
meet with a fate that not many years ago was 
reckoned an ignominy, that they may be sent to the 
colonies ! for 

" Arts and sciences will travel west," 
and 

" The sad Nine in Britain's evil hour " 

will embark for America. 

I have been in Gloucestershire, and can add a 
little to the Catalogue, having seen Berkeley Castle, 
Thornbury Castle, and a charming small old house 
of the Abbots of Gloucester. Indeed I could not 
enjoy the first, for the Earl was in it with all his 
Militia, and dispelled visions. To Wentworth Castle 
I shall certainly make no visit this year. If I went 
any journey it would be to Paris; but indolence, 
persisting in her apprehensions of the gout, though 
I have had no symptoms of it for some time, will fix 
me here and hereabouts. I discover charms in 
idleness that I never had a notion of before, and 
perceive that age brings pleasures as well as takes 
away. There is a serenity in having nothing to do, 
that is delicious ; I am persuaded that little princes 
assumed the title of serene highness from that 
sensation. Your assured friend, 

Horace le Faineant. 

Given at our Castle of Nonsuch, Aug. 23, 1774. 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 141 



XLII. 

AN ADVENTURE ON THE THAMES. 

To John Crawfurd, Esq. 

Strawberry Hill, Sept. 26, 1774. 
You tell me to write to you, and I am certainly 
disposed to do anything I can to amuse you ; but 
that is not so easy a matter, for two very good 
reasons : you are not the most amusable of men, 
and I have nothing to amuse you with, for you are 
like electricity, you attract and repel at once ; and 
though you have at first a mind to know anything, 
you are tired of it before it can be told. I don't go 
to Almack's, nor amongst your acquaintance. Would 
you bear to hear of mine, — of Lady Blandford, Lady 
Anne Conolly, and the Duchess of Newcastle ? For 
by age and situation at this time of the year I live 
with nothing but old women. They do very well for 
me who have little choice left, and who rather prefer 
common nonsense to wise nonsense, — the only dif- 
ference I know between old women and old men. 
I am out of all politics, and never think of elections, 
which I think I should hate even if I loved politics ; 
just as if I loved tapestry I do not think I could talk 
over the manufacture of worsteds. Books I have 
almost done with too, — at least read only such as 
nobody else would read. In short, my way of life is 
too insipid to entertain anybody but myself, and 
though I am always employed, I must own I think 



142 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

I have given up everything in the world only to be 
busy about the most arrant trifles. 

Well, I have made out half a letter with a history 
very like the journal in the " Spectator " of the man, 
the chief incidents of whose life were stroking his 
cat and walking to Hampstead. Last night, indeed, 
I had an adventure that would make a great figure 
in such a narrative. You may be enjoying bright 
suns and serene horizons under the pole, but in this 
dismal southern region it has rained for this month 
without interruption. Lady Browne and I dined as 
usual on Sundays with Lady Blandford. Our gentle 
Thames was swelled in the morning to a very re- 
spectable magnitude, and we had thought of return- 
ing by Kew Bridge ; however, I persuaded her to try 
if we could not ferry, and when we came to the foot 
of the hill, the bargemen told us the water was sunk. 
We embarked, and had four men to push the ferry. 
The night was very dark, for though the moon was 
up, we could neither see her, nor she us. The 
bargemen were drunk, the poles would scarce reach 
the bottom, and in five minutes the rapidity of the 
current turned the barge round, and in an instant 
we were at Isleworth. The drunkenest of the men 
cried out, " She is gone, she is lost ! " meaning they 
had lost the management. Lady Browne fell into 
an agony, began screaming and praying to Jesus, 
and every land and water god and goddess, and I, 
who expected not to stop till we should run against 
Kew Bridge, was contriving how I should get home ; 
or what was worse, whether I must not step into 
some mud up to my middle, be wet through, and get 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 1 43 

the gout. With much ado they recovered the barge 
and turned it ; but then we ran against the piles of 
the new bridge, which startled the horses, who began 
kicking. My Phillis's terrors increased, and I 
thought every minute she would have begun con- 
fession. Thank you, you need not be uneasy; in 
ten minutes we landed very safely, and if we had 
been drowned, I am too exact not to have dated my 
letter from the bottom of the Thames. There ! 
there 's a letter ; I think you would not wish to read 
such another, even if written to somebody else. 
Yours ever. 



XLIII. 

CAUTIONS RELATING TO PARIS. 

To the Hon. H. S. Conway. 

Strawberry Hill, Sept. 28, 1774. 
Lady Ailesbury brings you this, 1 which is not a 
letter, but a paper of directions, and the counter- 
part of what I have written to Madame du DefTand. 
I beg of you seriously to take a great deal of notice 
of this dear old friend of mine. She will perhaps 
expect more attention ixovayotiy as my friend, and 
as it is her own nature a little, than will be quite 
convenient to you ; but you have an infinite deal of 
patience and good-nature, and will excuse it. I was 

1 Mr. Conway's military tour ended at Paris. His wife, 
Lady Ailesbury, and their daughter, Mrs. Darner, were to 
join him and spend the winter there. 



144 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

afraid of her importuning Lady Ailesbury, who has 
a vast deal to see and do, and, therefore, I have 
prepared Madame du Deffand, and told her Lady 
Ailesbury loves amusements, and that, having never 
been at Paris before, she must not confine her ; so 
you must pay for both, and it will answer ; and I do 
not, I own, ask this only for Madame du DerTand's 
sake, but for my own, and a little for yours. Since 
the late King's [Louis XV.] death she has not dared 
to write to me freely, and I want to know the present 
state of France exactly, both to satisfy my own curi- 
osity, and for her sake, as I wish to learn whether 
her pension, etc., is in any danger from the present 
Ministry, some of whom are not her friends. She 
can tell you a great deal if she will, — by that I don't 
mean that she is reserved, or partial to her own 
country against ours, quite the contrary ; she loves 
me better than all France together, — but she hates 
politics, and therefore, to make her talk on it, you 
must tell her it is to satisfy me, and that I want to 
know whether she is well at Court, whether she has 
any fears from the Government, particularly from 
Maurepas and Nivernois; and that I am eager to 
have Monsieur de Choiseul and ma grandmaman, 
the Duchess, restored to power. If you take it on 
this foot easily, she will talk to you with the utmost 
frankness and with amazing cleverness. I have told 
her you are strangely absent, and that, if she does 
not repeat it over and over, you will forget every 
syllable ; so I have prepared her to joke and be 
quite familiar with you at once. She knows more 
of personal characters, and paints them better, than 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALT OLE. 145 

anybody; but let this be between ourselves, for I 
would not have a living soul suspect that I get any 
intelligence from her, which would hurt her ; and, 
therefore, I beg you not to let any human being 
know of this letter, nor of your conversation with 
her, neither English nor French. 

Madame du DerTand hates les philosophes ; so you 
must give them up to her. She and Madame Geof- 
frin are no friends ; so, if you go thither, don't tell 
her of it. Indeed you would be sick of that house, 
whither all the pretended beaux esp7'its and. faux sa- 
vants go, and where they are very impertinent and 
dogmatic. 

Let me give you one other caution, which I shall 
give Lady Ailesbury too. Take care of your papers 
at Paris, and have a very strong lock to your porte- 
feuille. In the hotels garnis they have double keys 
to every lock, and examine every drawer and paper 
of the English they can get at. They will pilfer, 
too, whatever they can. I was robbed of half my 
clothes there the first time, and they wanted to hang 
poor Louis [his Swiss servant] to save the people of 
the house who had stolen the things.. 

Here is another thing I must say. Madame du 
Deffand has kept a great many of my letters, and, as 
she is very old, I am in pain about them. I have 
written to her to beg she will deliver them up to you 
to bring back to me, and I trust she will. If she 
does, be so good to take great care of them. If she 
does not mention them, tell her just before you come 
away, that I begged you to bring them ; and if she 
hesitates, convince her how it would hurt me to have 



146 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

letters written in very bad French, and mentioning 
several people, both French and English, fall into 
bad hands, and perhaps be printed. 

Let me desire you to read this letter more than 
once, that you may not forget my requests, which 
are very important to me ; and I must give you one 
other caution, without which all would be useless. 
There is at Paris a Mademoiselle de l'Espinasse, a 
pretended bel espi'it, who was formerly an humble 
companion of Madame du DefTand, and betrayed 
her and used her very ill. I beg of you not to let 
anybody carry you thither. It would disoblige my 
friend of all things in the world, and she would 
never tell you a syllable ; and I own it would hurt 
me, who have such infinite obligations to her that I 
should be very unhappy if a particular friend of 
mine showed her this disregard. She has done 
everything upon earth to please and serve me, and 
I owe it to her to be earnest about this attention. 
Pray do not mention it, it might look simple in me ; 
and yet I owe.it to her, as I know it would hurt her. 
And at her age, with her misfortunes, and with infi- 
nite obligations on my side, can I do too much to 
show my gratitude, or prevent her any new mortifi- 
cation? I dwell upon it, because she has some 
enemies so spiteful that they try to carry all English 
to Mademoiselle de l'Espinasse. 

I wish the Duchess of Choiseul may come to 
Paris while you are there ; but I fear she will not : 
you would like her of all things. She has more 
sense and more virtues than almost any human 
being. If you choose to see any of the savants, let 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE, 147 

me recommend Monsieur Buffon. He has not only 
much more sense than any of them, but is an excel- 
lent old man, humane, gentle, well-bred, and with 
none of the arrogant pertness of all the rest. If he 
is at Paris, you will see a good deal of the Comte de 
Broglie at Madame du Deffand's. He is not a 
genius of the first water, but lively, and sometimes 
agreeable. The Court, I fear, will be at Fontaine- 
bleau, which will prevent your seeing many, unless 
you go thither. Adieu ! at Paris ! I leave the rest 
of my paper for England, if I happen to have any-' 
thing particular to tell you. 



XLIV. 

DISTRESSED STATE OF THE KINGDOM. 
To Sir Horace Matin. 

Strawberry Hill, Nov. ii, 1774. 
I have very little to tell you. Every day may 
bring us critical news from America, which will give 
the chief color to the winter. I am in perfect igno- 
rance of the situation of affairs there. I live quietly 
here, unconnected with all factions, enjoying the 
delightful place I have made, and even enjoying my 
old age, since the gout keeps away. The bitterness 
of the last fit, succeeded by my stewardship, gives a 
flavor to my tranquillity that, perhaps, I should not 
taste so much, if I had not lost it for nearly a year 
and a half. I propose to be little absent hence till 
after Christmas, — a longer stay than I ever made in 



148 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

the country ; but what can I see in London that I 
have not seen fifty times over? There is a new 
race, indeed, but does it promise to make the times 
more agreeable ? Does the world talk of our orators, 
poets, or wits ? Oh, no ! It talks of vast fortunes 
made, or vast fortunes lost at play ! It talks of 
Wilkes at the top of the wheel, and of Charles Fox 
at the bottom ; all between is a blank. 

It is not much better anywhere else. The King 
of Prussia, the hero of the last war, has only been a 
pickpocket in Poland. The Austrian and Russian 
eagles have turned vultures, and preyed on desolated 
champaigns. The Turkish war ended one don't 
know how, without any signal action. France has 
been making Parliaments cross over and figure-in, 
and yet without the scene being at all amusing. 
For my part, I take Europe to be worn out. When 
Voltaire dies, we may say, " Good night ! " I don't 
believe this age will be more read than the Byzan- 
tine historians. 

Nov. 14th. 
There are advices from America that are said to 
be extremely bad. I don't know the particulars, 
but I have never augured well of that dispute ! I fear 
we neither know how to proceed or retreat ! I 
believe this is the case with many individuals, as 
well as with the public. Within this week we have 
had two deaths out of the common course. Brad- 
shaw, 1 a man well known of late, but in a more 
silent way than for his fa?ne to have reached you, 
shot himself yesterday sennight. His beginning 
1 Secretary of the Treasury. 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 1 49 

was very obscure ; when he grew more known, it 
was not to his honor. He has since been a very 
active Minister, of the second or third class, and 
more trusted, perhaps, than some of a higher class. 
Instead of making a great fortune, he had spent one, 
and could not go on a week longer. The Duke of 
Athol is dead as suddenly, — drowned certainly ; 
whether delirious from a fever or from some disap- 
pointment, is not clear. Two evenings ago Lord 
Berkeley shot a highwayman, — in short, frenzy is at 
work from top to bottom, and I doubt we shall not 
be cool till there has been a good deal of blood let. 
You and I shall, probably, not see the subsiding of 
the storm, if the humors do boil over; and can a 
nation be in a high fever without a crisis ? I see 
the patients ; I do not see the doctors. Adieu ! 



XLV. 

CONDUCT OF AMERICA CONTRASTED WITH THAT OF 
ENGLAND. 

To the Hon. H. S. Conway. 

Arlington Street, Dec. 15, 1774. 
As I wrote to Lady Aylesbury but on Tuesday, I 
should not have followed it so soon with this, if I 
had nothing to tell you but of myself. My gouts 
are never dangerous, and the shades of them not 
important. However, to despatch this article at 
once, I will tell you that the pain I felt yesterday 
in my elbow made me think all former pain did not 
deserve the name. Happily the torture did not last 



150 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

above two hours; and, which is more surprising, it 
is all the real pain I have felt ; for though my hand 
has been as sore as if flayed, and that both feet are 
lame, the bootikins demonstrably prevent or extract 
the sting of it, and I see no reason not to expect to 
get out in a fortnight more. Surely, if I am laid 
up but one month in two years, instead of five or 
six, I have reason to think the bootikins sent from 
heaven. 

The long-expected sloop is arrived at last, and 
is indeed a man-of-war / The General Congress 
have voted, a non- importation, a non-exportation, a 
non-consumption; that, in case of hostilities com- 
mitted by the troops at Boston, the several provinces 
will march to the assistance of their countrymen; 
that the cargoes of ships now at sea shall be sold 
on their arrival, and the money arising thence given 
to the poor at Boston ; that a letter, in the nature 
of a petition of rights, shall be sent to the King ; an- 
other to the House of Commons; a third to the 
people of England ; a demand of repeal of all the 
\ Acts of Parliament affecting North America passed 
during this reign, as also of the Quebec bill : and 
these resolutions not to be altered till such repeal is 
obtained. 

Well, I believe you do not regret being neither in 
Parliament nor in administration ! As you are an 
idle man, and have nothing else to do, you may sit 
down and tell one a remedy for all this. Perhaps 
you will give yourself airs, and say you was a prophet, 
and that prophets are not honored in their own coun- 
try. Yet, if you have any inspiration about you, I 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 151 

assure you it will be of great service ; we are at our 
wit's end, — which was no -great journey. Oh ! you 
conclude Lord Chatham's crutch will be supposed 
a wand, and be sent for. They might as well send 
for my crutch, — and they should not have it ; the 
stile is a little too high to help them over. His Lord- 
ship is a little fitter for raising a storm than laying 
one, and of late seems to have lost both virtues. 
The Americans at least have acted like men, gone 
to the bottom at once, and set the whole upon the 
whole. Our conduct has been that of pert children : 
we have thrown a pebble at a mastiff, and are sur- 
prised it was not frightened. Now we must be wor- 
ried by it, or must kill the guardian of the house, 
which will be plundered the moment little master 
has nothing but the old nurse to defend it. But I 
have done with reflections; you will be fuller of 
them than I. 



XLVI. 

ON PUBLIC AFFAIRS. 

To the Hon. H. S. Conway. 

January 22, 1 77 5. 

After the magnificent overture for peace from 
Lord Chatham, that I announced to Madame du 
Deffand, you will be most impatient for my letter. 
Ohime / you will be sadly disappointed. Instead 
of drawing a circle with his wand round the House 
of Lords, and ordering them to pacify America, on 



152 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

the terms he prescribed before they ventured to 
quit the circumference of his commands, he brought 
a ridiculous, uncommunicated, unconsulted motion 
for addressing the King immediately to withdraw the 
troops from Boston, as an earnest of lenient meas- 
ures. The Opposition stared and shrugged ; the 
courtiers stared and laughed. His own two or three 
adherents left him, except Lord Camden and Lord 
Shelburne, and except Lord Temple, who is not his 
adherent, and was not there. Himself was not much 
animated, but very hostile, — particularly on Lord 
Mansfield, who had taken care not to be there. He 
talked of three millions of Whigs in America, and 
told the Ministers they were checkmated and had 
not a move left to make. Lord Camden was as 
strong. Lord Suffolk was thought to do better than 
ever, and Lord Lyttleton's declamation was com- 
mended as usual. At last, Lord Rockingham, very 
punily, and the Duke of Richmond joined and sup- 
ported the motion ; but at eight at night it was re- 
jected by 68 to 18, though the Duke of Cumberland 
voted for it. 1 

This interlude would be only entertaining, if the 
scene was not so totally gloomy. The Cabinet have 
determined on civil war, and regiments are going 
from Ireland and our West Indian islands. On 
Thursday the plan of the war is to be laid before 
both Houses. 

1 This debate was the same one heard by Dr. Franklin, 
who said of Chatham's speech: " I have seen, in the course of 
my life, sometimes eloquence without wisdom, and often wis- 
dom without eloquence ; in the present instance, I see both 
united, and both, as I think, in the highest degree possible." 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 153 

To-morrow the Merchants carry their petition ; 
which, I suppose, will be coolly received, since, if 
I hear true, the system is to cut off all traffic with 
America at present — as, you know, we can revive 
it when we please. There, there is food for medi- 
tation ! Your reflections, as you understand the 
subject better than I do, will go further than mine 
could. Will the French you converse with be civil 
and keep their countenances? 

George Damer t' other day proclaimed your de- 
parture for the 25th; but the Duchess of Richmond 
received a whole cargo of letters from ye all on Fri- 
day night, which talk of a fortnight or three weeks 
longer. Pray remember it is not decent to be dan- 
cing at Paris when there is a civil war in your own 
country. You would be like the country squire who 
passed by with his hounds as the battle of Edgehill 
began. 



XLVII. 

PREPARATIONS FOR WAR WITH AMERICA. 

To Sir Horace Mann. 

Arlington Street, Jan. 25, 1775. 

The Duke of Gloucester is very ill. Had I be- 
gun my letter last night, I should have said, ex- 
tremely ill. It was reported and believed that he 
was dead ; but he slept eight hours last night, and 
his pulse was better this morning. The physicians, 
who gave no hopes yesterday, say to-night that they 



154 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

never saw any mortal symptoms. Be assured they 
speak as little truth of the past as they know of what 
is to come. The Duke has been declining this 
month ; and he was ordered to go abroad immedi- 
ately, but delayed — and now is not able to go. I 
hope in God he will get strength enough — I wish 
him abroad for every reason. The other Duke, his 
brother [Duke of Cumberland], has erected his 
standard in opposition, and though the Duke of 
Gloucester is too wise, I trust, to take such a part, 
he would be teased to death with the politics of the 
Luttrels, and had better be out of the way. 

The times are indeed very serious. Pacification 
with America is not the measure adopted. More 
regiments are ordered thither, and to-morrow a plan, 
I fear equivalent to a declaration of war, is to be 
laid before both Houses. They are bold Ministers, 
methinks, who do not hesitate on a civil war, in 
which victory may bring ruin, and disappointment 
endanger their heads. Lord Chatham has already 
spoken out : and though his outset [a motion in the 
Lords last Friday] was neither wise nor successful, 
he will certainly be popular again with the clamorous 
side, which no doubt will become the popular side 
too, for all wars are costly, and consequently griev- 
ous. Acquisition alone can make those burdens 
palatable ; and in a war with our own Colonies we 
must afflict instead of acquiring them, and cannot 
recover them without having undone them. I am 
still to learn wisdom and experience, if these things 
are not so. 

I thank you much for the opera of the Conclave. 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 155 

It loses greatly of its spirit by my unacquaintance 
with the dramatis persona. By the duration of the 
interregnum, I suppose there is a difficulty of choos- 
ing between the Crowns and the Jesuits; and the 
Cardinals more afraid of poison from the latter, than 
of the menaces of the former. Though old folks 
are not less ambitious than young, they have greater 
aversion to arsenic. But seriously, is it not amazing 
that the Jesuits can still exist, when their last crime * 
was sufficient to have drawn down vengeance on 
them, if they had not been proscribed before? 

We have no news of ordinary calibre ; but per- 
haps I grow too old to learn the lesser anecdotes of 
the town. I scarce ever go to public places, and 
live only with people who have turned the corner of 
adventures. Indeed in this country there is some- 
thing so singular and so new in most characters that 
all the world hears the history of the most remark- 
able performers. The winter is young yet ; I dare 
to say it will not long be barren. 



XLVIII. 

ON A PERFORMANCE OF JEPHSON'S "BRAGANZA." 

To the Rev. William Mason. 

Arlington Street, Feb. 18, 1775. 
" Braganza " was acted last night with prodigious 
success. The audience, the most impartial I ever 
saw, sat mute for two acts, and seemed determined 
1 Of poisoning Pope GanganellL 



156 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

to judge for themselves, and not be the dupes of 
the encomiums that had been so lavishly trumpeted. 
At the third act they grew pleased and interested ; 
at the fourth they were cooled and deadened by two 
unnecessary scenes; but at the catastrophe in the 
fifth they were transported. They clapped, shouted, 
huzzaed, cried bravo, and thundered out applause 
both at the end, and when given out again ; yet the 
action was not worthy of the poet. Mrs. Yates 
shone in the dignified scenes, but had not variety 
enough ; Smith, recalling Garrick in Richard III., 
played the Viceroy with great spirit ; but Reddish 
was pitiful and whining in the Duke ; Aikin ridicu- 
lous in the first old conspirator, and the Friar totally 
insignificant, though engaged in the principal scene 
in the play, where indeed he has too little to say. 
The charming beauties of the poetry were not yet 
discovered, and the faults in the conduct may be 
easily mended. In short, I trust, if this tragedy 
does not inspire better writers, that it will at least 
preserve the town from hearing with patience the 
stuff we have had for these fifty years. There was 
an excellent prologue written by Murphy. For my 
poor epilogue, though well delivered by Mrs. Yates, 
it appeared to me the flattest thing I ever heard, 
and the audience were very good in not groaning at 
it. I wish it could be spoken no more. The boxes 
are all taken for five and twenty nights, which are 
more than it can be acted this season. 

I went to the rehearsal with all the eagerness of 
eighteen, and was delighted to feel myself so young 
again. The actors diverted me with their dissatis- 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 157 

factions and complaints, and though I said all I 
could, committed some of what they call proprieties 
that were very improper, as seating the Duke and 
Duchess on a high throne, in the second act, which 
made the spectators conclude that the revolution, as 
I knew they would, had happened. The scenes and 
dresses were well imagined, and the stage hand- 
somely crowded. All this was wanted, for from the 
defect in the subject, which calls for but two acts, 
several scenes languished. A little more knowledge 
of the stage in the author may prevent this in his 
future plays. For his poetry, it is beautiful to the 
highest degree. He has another fault, which is a 
want of quick dialogue ; there is scarce ever a short 
speech, so that it will please more on reading, than 
in representation. I will send it to you the mo- 
ment it is published. 

There is nothing else new, nor do I hear of any- 
thing coming. v The war with America goes on 
briskly ; that is, as far as voting goes. A great ma- 
jority in both Houses is as brave as a mob ducking 
a pickpocket. They natter themselves they shall 
terrify the Colonies into submission in three months, 
and are amazed to hear that there is no such prob- 
ability. They might as well have excommunicated 
them, and left it to the devil to put the sentence 
k into execution. 

Good night, and write to me. 



158 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

XLIX. 
ON MASON'S LIFE OF GRAY. 

To the Rev. William Mason. 

Arlington Street, April 3, 1775. 
Well ! your book [Memoirs of Gray] is walk- 
ing the town in midday. How it is liked, I do not 
yet know. Were I to judge from my own feelings, 
I should say there never was so entertaining or in- 
teresting a work, that it is the most perfect model 
of biography, and must make Tacitus, and Agricola 
too, detest you. But as the world and simple I are 
not often of the same opinion, it will perhaps be 
thought very dull. If it is, all we can do is to 
appeal to that undutiful urchin, Posterity, who com- 
monly treats the judgment of its parents with con- 
tempt, though it has so profound a veneration for 
its most distant ancestors. As you have neither im- 
itated the teeth-breaking diction of Johnson, nor 
coined slanders against the most virtuous names in 
story, like modern historians [Dalrymple and Mac- 
pherson], you cannot expect to please the reigning 
taste. Few persons have had time, from their poli- 
tics, diversions, and gaming, to have read much of 
so large a volume, which they wili keep for the 
summer, when they have full as much of nothing to 
do. Such as love poetry, or think themselves poets, 
will have hurried to the verses and been disap- 
pointed at not finding half a dozen more Elegies in 
a Churchyard. A few fine gentlemen will have read 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 159 

one or two of the shortest letters, which not being 
exactly such as they write themselves, they will dis- 
like or copy next post ; they who wish or intend to 
find fault with Gray, you, or even me, have, to be 
sure, skimmed over the whole, except the Latin, for 
even spite, non est tanti — . The Reviewers, no 
doubt, are already writing against you, — not because 
they have read the whole, but because one's own 
name is always the first thing that strikes one in a 
book. The Scotch will be more deliberate, but not 
less angry ; and if not less angry, not more merciful. 
Every Hume, however spelled, will I don't know 
what do ; I should be sorry to be able to guess what. 
I have already been asked why I did not prevent pub- 
lication of the censure on David. The truth is (as 
you know) I never saw the whole together till now, 
and not that part ; and if I had, why ought I to have 
prevented it? Voltaire will cast an imbelle javelin 
sine ictu at Gray, for he loves to depreciate a dead 
great author, even when unprovoked, — even when 
he has commended him alive, or before he was so 
vain and so envious as he is now. The Rousseau,- 
rians will imagine that I interpolated the condemna- 
tion of his Elo'ise. In short, we shall have many sins 
laid to our charge, of which we are innocent ; but 
what can the malicious say against the innocent but 
what is not true? 

I am here in brunt to the storm ; you sit serenely 
aloof, and smile at its sputtering. So should I too, 
were I out of sight, but I hate to be stared at, 
and the object of whispers before my face. The 
Maccaronis will laugh out, for you say I am still in 



160 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

the fashionable world. " What ! " they will cry, as 
they read while their hair is curling, — " that old 
soul ; " for " old " and " old-fashioned " are synony- 
mous in the vocabulary of mode, alas ! Nobody is so 
sorry as I to be in the world's fashionable purlieus ; 
still, in truth, all this is a joke, and touches me little. 
I seem to myself a Struldbrug, who have lived past 
my time, and see almost my own life written before 
my face while I am yet upon earth, and as it were 
the only one of my contemporaries with whom I 
began the world. 'Well, in a month's time there 
will be little question of Gray, and less of me. 
America and feathers and masquerades will drive 
us into libraries ; and there I am well content to 
live as an humble companion to Gray and you, — 
and, thank my stars, not on the same shelf with the 
Macphersons and Dalrymples. 

One omission I have found, at which I wonder : 
you do not mention Gray's study of physic, of which 
he had read much, and I doubt to his hurt. I had 
not seen till now that delightful encomium on Cam- 
bridge, when empty of its inhabitants. It is as 
good as anything in the book, and has that true 
humor which I think equal to any of his excel- 
lencies. So has the apostrophe to Nicholls, " Why, 
you monster, I shall never be dirty and amused as 
long as I live ; " but I will not quote any more, 
though I shall be reading it and reading it for the 
rest of my life. 

But come, here is a task you must perform, and 
forthwith ; and if you will not write to me, you shall 
transcribble to me, or I will combustle you. Send 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 161 

me incontinently all the proper names that are 
omitted. You know how I love writing marginal 
notes in my books, and there is not a word in or 
out of the book of which I will be ignorant. To 
save you trouble, here is a list of who is's. Page 
152, fill up the asterisks; do. p. 174; do. 206; do. 
232 ; 249, Peer who is it? 250? do.; the Lady of 
Quality? 251; the leader, 275; who the asterisk, 
282? the Dr. who, 283? do. 284; the B.'s and E.'s 
288, where, whose is Stratton? 290, Lord? 

You see my queries are not very numerous. If 
you do not answer them I will not tell you a syllable 
of what the fashionable say of your book, and I do 
not believe you have another correspondent amongst 
them. At present they are laboring through a very 
short work, more peculiarly addressed to them, at 
least to a respectable part of them, the Jockey-Club, 
who, to the latter's extreme surprise, have been con- 
sulted on a point of honor by Mr. Fitzgerald, which, 
however, he has already decided himself with as 
little conscience as they could do in their most 
punctilious moments. 

If you will satisfy me, I will tell you the following 
bon-mot of Foote, but be sure you don't read what 
follows till you have obeyed my commands. Foote 
was at Paris in October, when Dr. Murray 'was, who 
adniiring or dreading his wit (for commentators dis- 
pute on the true reading) often invited him to din- 
ner with his nephew. The ambassador produced a 
very small bottle of Tokay, and dispensed it in very 
small glasses. The uncle, to prove how precious 
every drop, said it was of the most exquisite growth, 
11 



1 62 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

and very old. Foote, taking up the diminutive glass, 
and examining it, replied, " It is very little of its 
age." Return me my story if you don't perform 
the conditions. I wish I could send you anybody's 
else life to write ! 



CHARM OF MADAME DE SEVIGNE'S LETTERS.— THE 
AMERICAN WAR. 

To the Rev. William Mason. 

Strawberry Hill, Aug. 7, 1775. 
Let me tell you you have no more taste than 
Dr. Kenrick if you do not like Madame de Se- 
vigne's Letters. Read them again ; they are one 
of the very few books that, like Gray's Life, im- 
prove upon one every time one reads them. You 
have still less taste if you like my letters, which 
have nothing original; and if they have anything 
good, so much the worse, for it can only be from 
having read her letters and his. He came perfect 
out of the eggshell, and wrote as well at eighteen 
as ever he did, — nay, letters better ; for his natural 
humor was in its bloom, and not wrinkled by low 
spirits, dissatisfaction, or the character he had as- 
sumed. I do not care a straw whether Dr. Ken- 
rick and Scotland can persuade England that he was 
no poet. There is no common-sense left in this 
country, — 

" With Arts and Sciences it travelled West." 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 163 

The Americans will admire him and you, and 
they are the only people by whom one would wish 
to be admired. The world is divided into two na- 
tions, — men of sense that willhe free, and fools that 
like to be slaves. What a figure do two great em- 
pires make at this moment ! Spain, mistress of Peru 
and Mexico, amazes Europe with an invincible ar- 
mada; at last it sails to Algiers, and disbarks its 
whole contents, even to the provisions of the fleet. 
It is beaten shamefully, loses all its stores, and has 
scarce bread left to last till it gets back into its own 
ports ! 

Mrs. Britannia orders her senate to proclaim Amer- 
ica a continent of cowards, and vote it should be 
starved unless it will drink tea with her. She sends 
her only army to be besieged in one of their towns, 
and half her fleet to besiege the terra firma ; but 
orders her army to do nothing, in hopes that the 
American senate at Philadelphia will be so frightened 
at the British army being besieged in Boston that 
it will sue for peace. At last she gives her army 
leave to sally out; but being twice defeated, she 
determines to carry on the war so vigorously, till she 
has not a man left, that all England will be satisfied 
with the total loss of America ! And if everybody is 
satisfied, who can be blamed ? Besides, is not our 
dignity maintained? have not we carried our ma- 
jesty beyond all example ? When did you ever read 
before of a besieged army threatening military exe- 
cution on the country of the besiegers ? — car tel est 
notre plaisir / But, alack ! we are like the mock 
Doctor, — we have made the heart and the liver 



1 64 LETTERS OF HORACE W ALP OLE. 

change sides; cela etait autrefois ainsi, mats nous 
avons change tout cela ! 



LI. 

AMERICA AND THE ADMINISTRATION. 

To Sir Horace Mann. 

Paris, Sept. 7, 1775. 
Your letter of August 1 2 followed me hither from 
England. I can answer it from hence with less 
reserve than I should at home. I understand very 
well, my dear sir, the propriety of the style in which 
you write in your ministerial capacity, and never 
wish to have you expose yourself to any inconve- 
nience by unnecessary frankness. I am too much 
convinced of your heart and head not swerving from 
the glorious principles in which we were both edu- 
cated, to suspect you of having adopted the princi- 
ples instilled into so many Englishmen by Scotch 
Jacobites, the authors of the present, as they have 
been of every, civil war since the days of Queen 
Elizabeth. You will on your side not be surprised 
that I am what I always was, a zealot for liberty in 
every part of the globe, and consequently that I 
most heartily wish success to the Americans. They 
have hitherto not made one blunder; and the ad- 
ministration have made a thousand, besides the two 
capital ones of first provoking and then of uniting 
the Colonies. The latter seem to have as good 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 165 

heads as hearts, as we want both. The campaign 
seems languishing. The Ministers will make all 
their efforts against the spring. So no doubt will 
the Americans too. Probably the war will be long. 
On the side of England, it must be attended with 
ruin. If England prevails, English ^nd American 
liberty is at an end; if the Colonies prevail, our 
commerce is gone; and if, at last, we negotiate, 
they will neither forgive nor give us our former 
V advantages. 

The country where I now am is, luckily, neither 
in a condition or disposition to meddle. If it did, 
it would complete our destruction, even by only 
assisting the Colonies, which I can scarce think they 
are blind enough not to do. They openly talk of 
our tyranny and folly with horror and contempt, and 
perhaps with amazement ; and so does almost every 
foreign Minister here, as well as every Frenchman. 
Instead of being mortified, as I generally am when 
my country is depreciated, I am comforted by find- 
ing that, though but one of very few in England, the 
sentiments of the rest of the world concur with and 
confirm mine. The people with us are fascinated ; 
and what must we be when Frenchmen are shocked 
at our despotic acts ! Indeed, both this nation and 
their king seem to embrace the most generous prin- 
ciples, — the only fashion, I doubt, in which we shall 
not imitate them ! Too late our eyes will open. 

The Duke and Duchess 1 [of Gloucester] are at 
Venice. Nothing ever exceeded the distinctions 

1 Walpole's niece, formerly Countess of Waldegrave, now 
Duchess of Gloucester. 



1 66 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

paid to them in this country. The king even in- 
vited them to Paris; but the Duke's haste to be 
more southerly before the bad weather begins, would 
not permit him to accept of that honor. They do 
not expect the same kindness everywhere ; and for 
the English, they have even let the French see what 
slaves they are, by not paying their duty to the Duke 
and Duchess. I have written to her, without nam- 
ing you, to dissuade their fixing at Rome, — I fear 
in vain. I proposed Sienna to them, as I natter 
myself the Emperor's goodness for the Duke would 
dispose the Great Duke to make it agreeable to 
them ; and their residence there would not commit 
you. Indeed, I do not believe you suspect me of 
sacrificing you to the interests of my family. On 
the other hand, I wish you, for your own sake, to 
take any opportunities of paying your court to them 
indirectly. They are both warm and hurt at the 
indignities they have received. In our present dis- 
tracted situation, it is more than possible that the 
Duke may be a very important personage. I know 
well that you have had full reason to be dissatisfied 
with him ; I remember it as much as you can : but 
you are too prudent, as well as too good-natured, 
not to forgive a young prince. I own I am in pain 
about the Duchess. She has all the good qualities 
of her father [Sir Edward Walpole], but all his im- 
petuosity; and is much too apt to resent affronts, 
though her virtue and good-nature make her as 
easily reconciled : but her first movements are not 
discreet. I wish you to please her as much as pos- 
sible, within your instructions. She has admirable 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 167 

sense, when her passions do not predominate. In 
one word, her marriage has given me many a pang ; 
and though I never gave into it, I endeavor by 
every gentle method to prevent her making her 
situation still worse; and above all things, I try 
never to inflame. It is all I can do where I have 
no ascendant, which, with a good deal of spirit of 
my own, I cannot expect : however, as I perfectly 
understand both my parties and myself, I manage 
pretty well. I know when to stoop and when to 
stop ; and when I will stoop or will not. I should 
not be so pliant if they were where they ought 
to be. 

Lord Chatham when I left England was in a very 
low, languishing way, his constitution, I believe, too 
much exhausted to throw out the gout ; and then it 
falls on his spirits. The last letters speak of his 
case as not desperate. He might, if allowed — and 
it was practicable — do much good still. Who else 
can, I know not. The Opposition is weak every 
way. They have better hearts than the Ministers, 
fewer good heads, — not that I am in admiration of 
the latter. Times may produce men. We must 
trust to the book of events, if we will flatter our- 
selves. Make no answer to this; only say you 
received my letter from Paris, and direct to Eng- 
land. I may stay here a month longer, but it is 
uncertain. 

nth. 

P. S. — I had made up my letter ; but those I re- 
ceived from England last night bring such important 



1 68 LETTERS OF HORACE W ALP OLE. 

intelligence, I must add a paragraph. That miracle 
of gratitude, the Czarina, has consented to lend 
England twenty thousand Russians, to be transported 
to America. The Parliament is to meet on the 20th 
of next month, and vote twenty-six thousand sea- 
men ! What a paragraph of blood is there ! With 
what torrents must liberty be preserved in America ! 
In England, what can save it? Oh, mad, mad 
England ! What frenzy, to throw away its treasures, 
lay waste its empire of wealth, and sacrifice its free- 
dom, that its prince may be the arbitrary lord of 
boundless deserts in America, and of an impover- 
ished, depopulated, and thence insignificant, island 
in Europe ! And what prospect of comfort has a 
true Englishman? Why, that Philip II. miscarried 
against the boors of Holland, and that Louis XIV. 
could not replace James II. on the throne ! 



III. 

MISERABLE SITUATION OF ENGLAND. 

To Sir Horace Mann. 

Paris, Oct. 10, 1775. 
I am still here, though on the wing. Your answer 
to mine from hence was sent back to me from Eng- 
land, as I have loitered here beyond my intention, — 
in truth, from an indisposition of mind. I am not 
impatient to be in a frantic country that is stabbing 
itself in every vein. The delirium still lasts, though, 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 169 

I believe, kept up by the quacks that caused it. Is 
it credible that five or six of the great trading towns 
have presented addresses against the Americans ? I 
have no doubt but those addresses are procured by 
those boobies, the country gentlemen, their members, 
and bought of the aldermen ; but is it not amazing 
that the merchants and manufacturers do not duck 
such tools in a horse-pond? When the storm will 
recoil I do not know; but it will be terrible in all 
probability, though too late. Never shall we be 
again what we have been ! Other Powers, who sit 
still, and wisely suffer us to plunge over head and 
ears, will perhaps be alarmed at what they write 
from England, that we are to buy twenty thousand 
Russian assassins, at the price of Georgia. How 
deep must be our game when we pursue it at the 
expense of establishing a new maritime power, and 
aggrandize that engrossing throne, which threatens 
half Europe, for the satisfaction of enslaving our own 
brethren ! Horrible policy ! If the Americans, as 
our papers say, are on the point of seizing Canada, 
I should think that France would not long remain 
neuter, when she may regain her fur-trade with the 
Canadians, or obtain Canada from the Americans. 
But it is endless to calculate what we may lose. 
Our Court has staked everything against despotism, 
and the nation, which must be a loser, whichever 
side prevails, takes part against the Americans, who 
fight for the nation as well as for themselves. What 
Egyptian darkness ! 

This country is far more happy. It is governed 
by benevolent and beneficent men, under a prince 



170 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

who has not yet betrayed a fault, and who will be as 
happy as his people if he always employs such men. 
Messieurs de Turgot and Malesherbes are philoso- 
phers in the true sense, — that is, legislators ; but as 
their plans tend to serve the public, you may be 
sure they do not please interested individuals. The 
French, too, are light and fickle; and designing 
men, who have no weapon against good men but 
ridicule, already employ it to make a trifling nation 
laugh at its benefactors : and if it is the fashion to 
laugh, the laws of fashion will be executed preferably 
to those of common-sense. 

There is a great place just vacant. The Marechal 
de Muy, Secretaire d'Etat pour la Guerre, died 
yesterday, having been cut the day before for the 
stone. The operation lasted thirty-five ages, — 
that is, minutes. 

Our Parliament meets on the 26th, and I suppose 
will act as infamously as it did last year. It cannot 
do worse, — scarcely so ill ; for now it cannot act 
inconsiderately. To joke in voting a civil war is 
the comble of infamy. I hope it will present flatter- 
ing addresses on our disgraces, and heap taxes on 
those who admire the necessity of them. If the 
present generation alone would be punished by 
inviting the yoke, it were pity but it were already 
on their necks ! Do not wonder at my indignation, 
nor at my indulging it. I can write freely hence ; 
from England, where I may find the Inquisition, it 
would not be so prudent. But judge of our situation 
when an Englishman, to speak his mind, must come 
to France ! and hither I will come, unless the times 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 171 

alter. I had rather live where a Maupeou [Chan- 
cellor of France] is banished, than where he is 
Chief Justice. 1 

I know nothing of their Royal Highnesses [the 
Duke and Duchess of Gloucester], nor have heard 
of them since they were at Strasburg. I wrote 
twice to Venice ; and if they think me in England, 
and have written thither, I should have received the 
letter, as I did yours, unless it is stopped. I can 
give you no advice, but to act prudently and 
decently, as you always do. If you receive orders, 
you must obey them ; if you do not, you may show 
disposition. And yet I would not go too far. Even 
under orders you may intimate concern; but I 
would express nothing in writing. My warmth may 
hurt myself, but never shall make me forget the 
interest of my friends. Adieu ! 



LIII. 

ON THE DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE. 
To Sir Horace Mann. 

Strawberry Hill, Aitg. 11, 1776. 
I have so little to tell you, though perhaps at the 
eve of so much, that I shall, I think, only begin this 
letter to show you the constancy of my attention, 
but not send it till it is fuller. 

You have seen by the public newspapers that 
General Carleton has driven the provincials out of 
all Canada. It is well he fights better than he 
1 Alluding to Lord Mansfield. 



172 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

writes ! General Conway has constantly said that he 
would do great service. The provincials revenge 
themselves on our ships, took nine Jamaica-men at 
once, and have just taken two transports with 
troops, besides half or three quarters starving out 
West India Islands. General Howe has left Halifax 
since the beginning of June, on an expedition. 
Nearly a fortnight ago he was heard of off New 
York, and great anxiety was afloat to know farther. 
Yesterday came letters that he had landed on an 
island near, without molestation, but learned that the 
opposite coast was covered with an hundred cannon, 
behind which lay a strong army intrenched up to 
their eyes. This does not diminish the anxiety for 
the event. His brother, the peer, had not joined 
him. Not that there are appearances promising 
negotiation. The Congress has declared all the 
provinces independent, has condemned the Mayor 
of New York to be hanged for corresponding with 
their enemies, and have seized Franklin, — not the 
famous doctor, but one of the king's governors. I 
hope this savage kind of war will not proceed ; but 
they seem to be very determined, and that makes 
the prospect very melancholy. 

I have been much alarmed lately about General 
Conway, who by a sudden cold had something of 
a paralytic stroke in the face ; but as it did not 
affect his speech or health, and is almost disap- 
peared, I am much easier. He is uneasy himself, 
with reason, about his daughter. 1 Her husband 

1 The Honorable Ann Seymour Conway Damer, of whom 
Walpole was especially fond. On his death he devised 
Strawberry Hill to her for life. 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 173 

and his two brothers have contracted a debt — one 
can scarcely expect to be believed out of England 
— of seventy thousand pounds ! Who but must 
think himself happy to marry a daughter with only 
ten thousand pounds to a young man with five 
thousand pounds a year rent-charge in present, and 
twenty-two thousand a year settled ? And yet this 
daughter at present is ruined ! Her behavior is such 
as her father's would be ; she does not only not 
complain, but desires her very own jewels may be 
sold. The young men of this age seem to have 
made a law amongst themselves for declaring their 
fathers superannuated at fifty, and then dispose of 
the estates as if already their own. 

How culpable to society was Lord Holland for 
setting an example of paying such enormous, such 
gigantic debts ! Can you believe that Lord Foley's 
two sons have borrowed money so extravagantly 
that the interest they have contracted to pay 
amounts to eighteen thousand pounds a year? I 
write the sum at length, lest you should think I 
have mistaken, and set down two or three figures 
too much. The legislature sits quiet, and says it 
cannot put a stop to such outrageous doings ; but 
thus is it punished for winking at the plunder of 
the Indies, which cannot suffice. Our Jews and 
usurers continue to lounge at home, and commit as 
much rapine as Lord Clive ! 

Wednesday, \\th. 
As I doubt whether we shall hear any considera- 
ble news soon, I have determined to send away this 



174 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

letter, lest it should be superannuated. The Ga- 
zette has already got the start of it, and told you 
all it pretended to tell. In truth, my letters are 
little more than companions of the newspapers, or 
at best evidences for their veracity, which they want. 
It is incredible how both sides lie about the Amer- 
ican war. Even that laconic personage the Gazette 
has been known to fib, and always takes care not to 
tell a syllable of bad news. I live here alone, and 
never hear any but with all the world. Whenever 
this war shall end, I believe it will be very new; 
for except two or three great facts, I question 
whether we, the public, know anything of the 
matter. 



LIV. 

ON THE SUICIDE OF MR. DAMER. 
To Lady Ossory. 

August 1 6, 1776. 

I began this yesterday, and was interrupted. To- 
day I have heard the shocking news of Mr. Darner's 
death, who shot himself yesterday, at three o'clock 
in the morning, at a tavern in Covent Garden. My 
first alarm was for Mr. Conway, not knowing what 
effect such a horrid surprise would have on him, 
scarce recovered from an attack himself; happily it 
proves his nerves were not affected, for I have had 
a very calm letter from him on the occasion. They 
have sent for me to town, and I shall go to-morrow 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 175 

morning. Mr. Charles Fox, with infinite good- 
nature, met Mrs. Damer coming to town, and 
stopped her to prepare her for the dismal event. 
It is almost impossible to refrain from bursting out 
into common-place reflections on this occasion; 
but can the walls of Almack's help moralizing, 
when ,£5000 a year in present, and ^22,000 in 
reversion are not sufficient for happiness, and 
cannot check a pistol? — 

For the first time in my life I think I do not 
wish Lord Ossory a son, or Lady Anne greatly mar- 
ried ! What a distracted nation ! I do not wonder 
Dr. Battie died worth ^100,000. Will anybody be 
worth a shilling but mad doctors? I could write 
volumes ; but recollect that you are not alone, as I 
am, given up to melancholy ideas, with the rain 
beating on the skylight, and gusts of wind. On 
other nights, if I heard a noise, I should think it 
was some desperate gamester breaking open my 
house ; now, every flap of a door is a pistol. I 
have often said, this world is a comedy to those 
that think, a tragedy to those that feel; but when 
I thought so first, I was more disposed to smile than 
to feel ; and besides, England was not arrived at its 
present pitch of frenzy. I begin to doubt whether 
I have not lived in a system of errors. All my 
ideas are turned topsy-turvy. One must go to 
some other country and ask whether one has a just 
notion of anything. To me, everybody round me 
seems lunatic; yet I think they were sober and 
wise folks from whom I received all my notions on 
money, politics, and what not. Well ! I will wait 



176 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

for the echo — I know no better oracle. Good 
night, madam ; you excuse me in any mood, and 
therefore I will make no apology for this incoherent 
rhapsody. My thoughts, with those I love, always 
flow according to the cast of the hour. A good 
deal of sensibility and very shattered nerves expose 
one to strong impressions. Yet when the sages of 
this world affect a tenderness they do not know, 
may not a little real feeling be pardoned ? It seems 
Mentor Duke of Montague had made a vow of ever 
wearing weepers for his vixen turtle, and it required 
a jury of matrons and divines to persuade him he 
would not go to the devil and his wife if he ap- 
peared in scarlet and gold on the Prince's birth- 
day ; but he is returned to close mourning, like 
Hamlet, and every Rosencrantz and Guildenstern 
is edified both ways. 



LV. 

GRAY'S CENOTAPH. -MASON'S " CARACTACUS." 

To the Rev. William Mason. 

Arlington Street, Oct. 8, 1776. 
I answer your letter incontinently, because I am 
charmed with your idea of the cenotaph for Gray, 
and would not have it wait a moment for my appro- 
bation. I do not know what my lines were, for I 
gave them to you, or have burnt or lost them ; but 
I am sure yours are ten times better, as anything 
must naturally be when you and I write on the 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 177 

same subject. I prefer Westminster Abbey to 
Stoke or Pembroke chapel, — not because due to 
Gray, whose genius does not want any such dis- 
tinction, but as due to Westminster Abbey, which 
would miss him, and to humble the French, who 
have never had a Homer or a Pindar, nor probably 
will have, since Voltaire could make nothing more 
like an epic poem than the " Henriade," and 
Boileau and Rousseau have succeeded so little in 
odes that the French still think that ballad-wright 
Quinault their best lyric poet; which shows how 
much they understand lyric poetry ! Voltaire has 
lately written a letter against Shakspeare (occa- 
sioned by the new paltry translation, which still 
has discovered his miraculous powers) ; and it is 
as downright Billingsgate as an apple-woman would 
utter if you overturned her wheelbarrow. Poor 
old wretch, how envy disgraces the brightest 
talents ! How Gray adored Shakspeare ! Part- 
ridge, the almanac-maker, perhaps was jealous 
of Sir Isaac Newton. Dr. Goldsmith told me he 
himself envied Shakspeare ; but Goldsmith was 
an idiot, with once or twice a fit of parts. It 
hurts one when a real genius like Voltaire can 
feel more spite than admiration; though I am 
persuaded that his rancor is grounded on his 
conscious inferiority. I wish you would lash this 
old scorpion a little, and teach him awe of English 
poets. 

I can tell you nothing more than you see in the 
common newspapers. Impatience is open-mouthed 
and open-eared for accounts from New York, on 



178 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

which the attack was to be made on the 26th of 
August. Success there is more necessary to keep 
up credit than likely to do more. Should it fail, 
there is an end of America for England ; and if it 
succeeds, it is at most ground for another campaign. 
But we choose not to see till we feel, though they 
who have done the mischief do not disguise their 
apprehensions. The colonies have an agent openly 
at Versailles, and their ships are as openly received 
into their ports. But I had rather talk of " Carac- 
tacus : " I agree that he will not suffer by not being 
sputtered by Barry, who has lost all his teeth. 
Covent Garden is rather above Drury Lane in 
actors, though both sets are exceedingly bad, — 
so bad that I almost wish " Caractacus " was not 
to appear. Very seldom do I go to the play, for 
there is no bearing such strollers. I saw " Lear " 
the last time Garrick played it, and, as I told him, 
I was more shocked at the rest of the company 
than pleased with him, — which I believe was not 
just what he desired ; but to give a greater bril- 
liancy to his own setting, he had selected the very 
worst performers of his troop, — just as Voltaire 
would wish there were no better poets than Thom- 
son and Akenside. However, as " Caractacus " has 
already been read, I do not doubt but it will suc- 
ceed. It would be a horrible injury to let him be 
first announced by such unhallowed mouths. In 
truth, the present taste is in general so vile that I 
don't know whether it is not necessary to blunt 
real merit before it can be applauded. 

I have not time to say more. I can say nothing 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 1 79 

about law, but that I always avoid it if I can, — that 
and everything else wants reformation; and I be- 
lieve we shall have it from that only reformer, 
Adversity. I wish I were with you and the good 
Palsgrave, and I always wish you was with me. 
Adieu ! Yours ever. 



LVI. 

CONCERNING VOLTAIRE'S ABUSE OF SHAKSPEARE. 

To Sir Horace Mann. 

Strawberry Hill, Dec. i, 1776. 
I don't know who the Englishwoman is of whom 
you give so ridiculous a description, but it will 
suit thousands. I distrust my age continually, and 
impute to it half the contempt I feel for my 
country men and women. If I think the other half 
well founded, it is by considering what must be 
said hereafter of the present age. What is to im- 
press a great idea of us on posterity? In truth, 
what do our contemporaries of all other countries 
think of us? They stare at and condemn our 
politics and follies ; and if they retain any respect 
for us, I doubt it is for the sense we have had. I 
do know, indeed, one man who still worships us ; 
but his adoration is testified so very absurdly 
as not to do us much credit. It is a Monsieur 
de Marchais, first valet-de-chambre to the king 
of France. He has the angloi?ianie so strong that 
he has not only read more English than French 



180 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

books, but if any valuable work appears in his own 
language he waits to peruse it till it is translated 
into English ; and to be sure our translations of 
French are admirable things ! 

To do the rest of the French justice, — I mean 
such as like us, — they adopt only our egregious 
follies, and in particular the flower of them, horse- 
racing ! Le Roi Pepin, a racer, is the horse in 
fashion. I suppose the next shameful practice of 
ours they naturalize will be the personal scurrilities 
in the newspapers, especially on young and hand- 
some women, in which we certainly are originals ! 
Voltaire, who first brought us into fashion in France, 
is stark mad at his own success. Out of envy to 
writers of his own nation he cried up Shakspeare ; 
and now is distracted at the just encomiums be- 
stowed on that first genius of the world in the new 
translation. He sent to the French Academy an 
invective that bears all the marks of passionate 
dotage. Mrs. Montagu 1 happened to be present 
when it was read. Suard, one of their writers, said 
to her, "Je crois, madame, que vous etes un peu 
fache de ce que vous venez d'entendre." She 
replied, " Moi, monsieur ! point du tout ! Je ne 
suis pas amie de Monsieur Voltaire." I shall go 
to town the day after to-morrow, and will add a 
postscript, if I hear any news. 

Dec. 3d. 

I am come late, have seen nobody, and must 
send away my letter. 

1 Mrs. Robinson Montagu, who wrote the defence of 
Shakspeare against Voltaire. 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 181 

LVII. 
ON SIR JOHN HAWKINS'S " HISTORY OF MUSIC." 
To the Countess of Ossory. 

Arlington Street, Dec. 3, 1776. 

I should not have waited for a regular response, 
madam, if I had not been precisely in the same 
predicament with your Ladyship, — reduced to write 
from old books to tell you anything new. I have 
been three days at Strawberry, and have not seen 
a creature but Sir John Hawkins's five volumes, the 
last two of which, thumping as they are, I literally 
did read in two days. They are old books to all 
intents and purposes, very old books ; and what is 
new is like old books too, — that is, full of minute 
facts that delight antiquaries : nay, if there had 
never been such things as parts and taste, this work 
would please everybody. The first volume is ex- 
tremely worth looking at, for the curious fac-similes 
of old music and old instruments, and so is the 
second. The third is very heavy ; the two last will 
amuse you, I think, exceedingly, — at least they 
do me. 

My friend Sir John is a matter-of-fact man, and 
does now and then stoop very low in quest of game. 
Then he is so exceedingly religious and grave as to 
abhor mirth, except it is printed in the old black- 
letter; and then he calls the most vulgar ballad 
pleasant and full of humor. He thinks nothing 
can be sublime but an anthem, and Handel's cho- 



1 82 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

ruses heaven upon earth.' However, he writes with 
great moderation, temper, and good sense, and the 
book is a very valuable one. I have begged his 
Austerity to relax in one point, for he ranks comedy 
with farce and pantomime. Now, I hold a perfect 
comedy to be the perfection of human composition, 
and believe firmly that fifty Iliads and ^Eneids 
could be written sooner than such a character as 
Falstaff s. Sir John says that Dr. Wallis discovered 
that they who are not charmed with music want a 
nerve in their brain. This would be dangerous 
anatomy. I should swear Sir John wants the comic 
nerve ; and by parity of reason we should ascribe 
new nerves to all those who have bad taste, or are 
delighted with what others think ridiculous. We 
should have nerves like Romish saints to preside 
over every folly; and Mr. Cosmo must have a 
nerve which I hope Dr. Wallis would not find in 
fifty thousand dissections. Rechin, too, had a sort 
of nerve that is lost, like the music of the ancients ; 
yet, perhaps, the royal touch could revive it more 
easily than it cures the Evil. 

4/vfc. 
The quarrel between the SS. Cosmo and Damian, 
they say, is at an end. I kept back my letter in 
hopes of something to tell your Ladyship ; but there 
is a universal yawn, and the town as empty as in 
August. I heard only a good story of Mrs. Bos- 
cawen, the admiral's widow, who lives near London, 
and came to town as soon as she had dined at her 
country hour. She said, " I expected to find every- 
body at dinner ; but instead of that, I found all the 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 183 

young ladies strolling about the streets, and not 
thinking of going home to dress for dinner : so I 
had set out in the evening, and yet got to town in 
the morning of the same day." 

I shall stay here for Mr. Mason's " Caractacus," 
that is to be acted on Friday, and then return to 
my Hill. 

LVIII. 

ON SENSIBILITY AS A FACTOR IN HAPPINESS. 
To the Countess of Ossory. 

Sunday, Jan. 19, 1777. 
You may imagine, madam, how much I was 
touched with Lady Anne's sensibility for me ! and 
to give you some proof of mine, the very next re- 
flection was, that I was sorry she promises to 
have so much. It is one of those virtues whose 
kingdom is not of this world, but, like patience, 
is forever tried, with the greater disadvantage of 
wanting power to remedy half the misfortunes it 
feels for. Sensibility is one of the master-springs, 
on which most depends the color of our lives, and 
determines our being happy or miserable. I have 
often said that this world is a comedy to those who 
think, a tragedy to those who feel ; and sensibility 
has not only occasion to suffer for others, but is 
sure of its own portion too. Had I children, and 
the option of bestowing dispositions on them, I 
should be strangely puzzled to decide. Could one 
refuse them feelings that make them amiable, or 



1 84 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

confer what insures unhappiness? But indeed on 
what could one decide, were the fate of others or 
one's own left to our arbitrament? 

I have no opinion of my own wisdom, and little 
of anybody's else ; but I have an odd system, that 
what is called chance is the instrument of Provi- 
dence and the secret agent that counteracts what 
men call wisdom, and preserves order and regular- 
ity, and continuation in the whole ; for you must 
know, madam, that I firmly believe, notwithstanding 
all our complaints, that almost every person upon 
earth tastes upon the totality more happiness than 
misery; and therefore, if we could correct the 
world to our fancies, and with the best intentions 
imaginable, probably we should only produce more 
misery and confusion. This totally contradicts 
what I said before, that sensibility or insensibility 
determines the complexion of our lives ; and yet 
if the former casts a predominating shade of sad- 
ness over the general tenor of our feelings, still 
that gloom is illumined with delicious flashes. It 
enjoys the comforts of the compassion it bestows 
and of the misfortune it relieves ; and the largest 
dose of the apathy of insensibility can never give 
any notion of the transport that thrills through the 
nerves of benevolence when it consoles the anguish 
of another ; but I am too much a sceptic to pretend 
to make or reconcile a system and its contradic- 
tions. No man was ever yet so great as to build 
that system in which other men could not discover 
flaws. All our reasoning, therefore, is very imper- 
fect, and this is my reason for being so seldom 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 185 

serious and for never disputing. I look upon 
human reason as I do on the parts of a promising 
child, — it surprises, may improve or stop short, 
but is not come to maturity ; and therefore, if you 
please, I will talk of the Birthday and things more 
suited to my capacity. 

I had a shining circle on the evening of that 
great solemnity, — the Duke and Duchess of Rich- 
mond, Lady Pembroke, Lady Strafford, Mr. Conway 
and Lady Ailesbury, in all their gorgeous attire. 
Lady Warwick, I hear, looked charmingly; but 
pray, madam, must you, to possess Miss Vernon 
to the last minute, lock her and yourself up in the 
country? You make no answer to my question of 
when you come. I can allow you but one week 
more. I propose to take the air on Thursday and 
Friday, to air myself at Strawberry on Saturday 
and Sunday, and be ready on the Monday to wait 
on you in Grosvenor Place. 

Lord Dillon told me this morning that Lord 
Besborough and he, playing at quinze t' other night 
with Miss Pelham, and happening to laugh, she 
flew into a passion and said, " It was terrible to 
play with boys ! " and our two ages together, said 
Lord Dillon, make up above a hundred and forty. 

Sir George Warren lost his diamond order in the 
Council Chamber at the Birthday in the crowd of 
loyal subjects. Part of Georgia is said to be re- 
turned to its allegiance to King George and Lord 
George. Charles Fox, I just hear, is arrived, and, 
I conclude, Mr. Fitzpatrick. My awkward hand 
has made a thousand blots, but I cannot help it. 



1 86 LETTERS OF HORACE W A LP OLE. 

LIX. 

DISCOURAGING OUTLOOK OF AFFAIRS IN AMERICA. 
To Sir Horace Mann. 

Strawberry Hill, April 3, 1777. 
I have nothing very new to tell you on public 
affairs, especially as I can know nothing more than 
you see in the papers. It is my opinion that the 
king's affairs are in a very bad position in America. 
I do not say that his armies may not gain advan- 
tages again ; though I believe there has been as 
much design as cowardice in the behavior of the 
provincials, who seem to have been apprised that 
protraction of the war would be more certainly 
advantageous to them than heroism. Washington, 
the dictator, has shown himself both a Fabius and a 
Camillus. His march through our lines is allowed 
to have been a prodigy of generalship. In one 
word, I look upon a great part of America as lost 
to this country ! It is not less deplorable that, 
between art and contention, such an inveteracy has 
been sown between the two countries as will prob- 
ably outlast even the war ! Supposing this un- 
natural enmity should not soon involve us in other 
wars, which would be extraordinary indeed, what a 
difference, in a future war with France and Spain, 
to have the Colonies in the opposite scale instead 
of being in ours ! What politicians are those who 
have preferred the empty name of sovereignty to 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 187 

that of alliance, and forced subsidies to the golden 
ocean of commerce ! 

Alas ! the trade of America is not all we shall 
lose. The ocean of commerce wafted us wealth at 
the return of regular tides ; but we had acquired an 
empire too, in whose plains the beggars we sent 
out as labourers could reap sacks of gold in three 
or four harvests, and who with their sickles and 
reaping-hooks have robbed and cut the throats of 
\ those who sowed the grain. These rapacious fora- 
gers have fallen together by the ears ; and our In- 
dian affairs, I suppose, will soon be in as desperate 
a state as our American. Lord Pigot [Governor 
of Madras] has been treacherously and violently 
imprisoned, and the Company here has voted his 
restoration. I know nothing of the merits of the 
cause on either side. I dare to say both are very 
blamable. I look only to the consequences, which 
I do not doubt will precipitate the loss of our ac- 
quisitions there, the title to which I never admired, 
and the possession of which I always regarded as a 
transitory vision. If we could keep it, we should 
certainly plunder it, till the expense of maintaining 
would overbalance the returns ; and though it has 
rendered a little more than the holy city of Jerusa- 
lem, I look on such distant conquests as more 
destructive than beneficial ; and whether we are 
martyrs or banditti, whether we fight for the Holy 
Sepulchre or for lakhs of rupees, I detest invasions 
of quiet kingdoms both for their sakes and for our 
own ; and it is happy for the former that the latter 
are never permanently benefited. 



1 88 LETTERS OF HORACE W A LP OLE. 

Though I have been drawn away from your letter 
by the subject of it and by political reflections, I 
must not forget to thank you for your solicitude and 
advice about my health ; but pray be assured that 
I am sufficiently attentive to it, and never stay long 
here in wet weather, which experience has told me 
is prejudicial. I am sorry for it, but I know Lon- 
don agrees with me better than the country. The 
latter suits my age and inclination ; but my health 
is a more cogent reason, and governs me. I know 
my own constitution exactly, and have formed my 
way of life accordingly. No weather, nothing gives 
me cold ; because, for these nine and thirty years 
I have hardened myself so, by braving all weathers 
and taking no precautions against cold, that the 
extremest and most sudden changes do not affect 
me in that respect. Yet damp, without giving me 
cold, affects my nerves ; and the moment I feel it I 
go to town. I am certainly better since my last 
fit of gout than ever I was after one ; in short, 
perfectly well, — that is, well enough for my age. In 
one word, I am very weak, but have no complaint ; 
and as my constitution, frame, and health require 
no exercise, nothing but fatigue affects me, and 
therefore you, and all who are so good as to interest 
themselves about me and give advice, must excuse 
me if I take none. I am preached to about taking 
no care against catching cold, and am told I shall 
one day or other be caught, — possibly ; but I must 
die of something, and why should not what has 
done to sixty, be right? My regimen and practice 
have been formed on experience and success. 



LETTERS OF HORACE W A LP OLE. 1S9 

Perhaps a practice that has suited the weakest of 
frames would kill a Hercules. God forbid I should 
recommend it, for I never saw another human being 
that would not have died of my darings, especially 
in the gout. Yet I have always found benefit, be- 
cause my nature is so feverish that everything cold, 
inwardly or outwardly, suits me. Cold air and water 
are my specifics, and I shall die when I am not 
master enough of myself to employ them, — or rather, 
as I said this winter, on comparing the iron texture 
of my inside with the debility of my outside, " I 
believe I shall have nothing but my inside left ! " 
Therefore, my dear sir, my regard for you will last 
as long as there is an atom of me remaining. 



LX. 



DISCLAIMING RESPONSIBILITY FOR CHATTERTON'S 
SUICIDE. 

To the Rev. William Cole. 

Strawberry Hill, June 19, 1777. 
I thank you for your notices, dear sir, and shall 
remember that on Prince William. I did see the 
" Monthly Review," but hope one is not guilty of 
the death of every man who does not make one the 
dupe of a forgery. I believe M'Pherson's success 
with " Ossian " was more the ruin of Chatterton than 
I. Two years passed between my doubting the 
authenticity of Rowley's poems and his death. I 
never knew he had been in London till some time 



190 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

after he had undone and poisoned himself there. 
The poems he sent me were transcripts in his own 
hand, and even in that circumstance he told a lie ; 
he said he had them from the very person at Bristol 
to whom he had given them. If any man was to 
tell you that monkish rhymes had been dug up at 
Herculaneum, which was destroyed several centuries 
before there was any such poetry, should you be- 
lieve it? Just the reverse is the case of Rowley's 
pretended poems. They have all the elegance of 
Waller and Prior, and more than Lord Surrey ; but 
I have no objection to anybody believing what he 
pleases. I think poor Chatterton was an astonish- 
ing genius, but I cannot think that Rowley fore- 
saw metres that were invented long after he was 
dead, or that our language was more refined at 
Bristol in the reign of Henry V. than it was at 
Court under Henry VIII. One of the chaplains of 
the Bishop of Exeter has found a line of Rowley in 
Hudibras — the monk might foresee that too ! The 
prematurity of Chatterton's genius is, however, full 
as wonderful as that such a prodigy as Rowley 
should never have been heard of till the eighteenth 
century. The youth and industry of the former are 
miracles too, yet still more credible. There is not 
a symptom in the poems, but the old words, that 
savours of Rowley's age ; change the old words 
for modern, and the whole construction is of 
yesterday. 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 191 

LXI. 
ADVICE TO A DRAMATIC WRITER. 

To Robert Jefthson, Esq. 

Strawberry Hill, July 13, 1777. 
You have perhaps, sir, paid too much regard to 
the observations I took the liberty to make, by 
your order, to a 1 few passages in " Vitellia," and I 
must hope they were in consequence of your own 
judgment too. I do not doubt of its success on 
the stage if well acted ; but I confess I would 
answer for nothing with the present set of actors, 
who are not capable in tragedy of doing any justice 
to it. Mrs. Barry seems to me very unequal to the 
principal part, to which Mrs. Yates alone is suited. 
Were I the author, I should be very sorry to have 
my tragedy murdered, perhaps miscarry. Your 
reputation is established, you will never forfeit it 
yourself; and to give your works to unworthy per- 
formers is like sacrificing a daughter to a husband 
of bad character. As to my offering it to Mr. Col- 
man, I could merely be the messenger. I am 
scarce known to him, have no right to ask a favor 
of him, and I hope you know me enough to think 
that I am too conscious of my own insignificance 
and private situation to give myself an air of pro- 
tection, and more particularly to a work of yours, 
sir. What could I say that would carry greater 
weight than " This piece is by the author of 
< Braganza ' ? " 



192 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

A tragedy can never suffer by delay ; a comedy 
may, because the allusions or the manners repre- 
sented in it may be temporary. I urge this, not to 
dissuade your presenting " Vitellia " to the stage, but 
tto console you if both theatres should be engaged 
next winter. My own interests, from my time of 
life, would make me with reason more impatient 
than you to see it represented ; but I am jealous of 
the honor of your poetry, and I should grieve to see 
"Vitellia" at Covent Garden, — not that, except 
Mrs. Yates, I have any partiality to the tragic actors 
at Drury Lane, though Smith did not miscarry in 
"Braganza;" but I speak from experience. I 
attended " Caractacus " last winter, and was greatly 
interested, both from my friendship for Mr. Mason 
and from the excellence of the poetry. I was out 
of all patience ; for though a young Lewis played a 
subordinate part very well, and Mrs. Hartley looked 
her part charmingly, the Druids were so massacred 
and Caractacus so much worse that I never saw a 
more barbarous exhibition. Instead of hurrying 
" The Law of Lombardy," — which, however, I shall 
delight to see finished, — I again wish you to try 
comedy. To my great astonishment, there were 
more parts performed admirably in " The School for 
Scandal " than I almost ever saw in any play. Mrs. 
Abington was equal to the first of her profession ; 
Yates (the husband), Parsons, Miss Pope, and 
Palmer, all shone. It seemed a marvellous resur- 
rection of the stage. Indeed, the play had as much 
merit as the actors. I have seen no comedy that 
comes near it since the " Provoked Husband." 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 193 

I said I was jealous of your fame as a poet, and 
I truly am. The more rapid your genius is, labor 
will but the more improve it. I am very frank, but 
I am sure that my attention to your reputation will 
excuse it. Your facility in writing exquisite poetry 
may be a disadvantage, as it may not leave you 
time to study the other requisites of tragedy so 
much as is necessary. Your writings deserve to 
last for ages ; but to make any work last, it must 
be finished in all parts to perfection. You have 
the first requisite to that perfection, for you can 
sacrifice charming lines when they do not tend to 
improve the whole. I admire this resignation so 
much that I wish to turn it to your advantage. 
Strike out your sketches as suddenly as you please, 
but retouch and retouch them, that the best judges 
may forever admire them. The works that have 
stood the test of ages, and been slowly approved at 
first, are not those that have dazzled contemporaries 
and borne away their applause, but those whose 
intrinsic and labored merit have shone the brighter 
on examination. I would not curb your genius, 
sir, if I did not trust it would recoil with greater 
force for having obstacles presented to it. 

You will forgive my not having sent you the 
" Thoughts on Comedy," as I promised. I have had 
no time to look them over and put them into shape. 
I have been and am involved in most unpleasant 
affairs of family, that take up my whole thoughts 
and attention. The melancholy situation of my 
nephew, Lord Orford, engages me particularly, and 
I am not young enough to excuse postponing busi- 
ly 



194 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

ness and duties for amusement. In truth I am 
really too old not to have given up literary pleas- 
ures. Nobody will tell one when one grows dull, 
but one's time of life ought to tell it one. I long 
ago determined to keep the archbishop in " Gil 
Bias " in my eye, when I should advance to his 
caducity; but as dotage steals in at more doors 
than one, perhaps the sermon I have been preach- 
ing to you is a symptom of it. You must judge of 
that, sir. If I fancy I have been wise, and have 
only been peevish, throw my lecture into the fire. 
I am sure the liberties I have taken with you de- 
serve no indulgence if you do not discern true 
friendship at the bottom of them. 



LXII. 

SYMPATHIZING WITH THE AMERICANS. 
To the Countess of Ossory. 

Thursday Night, Dec. n, 1777. 

I do not write, madam, to tell you politics ; you 
will hear them better from Lord Ossory : nor in- 
deed have I" words to paint the abject, impudent 
poltroonery of the Ministers, or the blockish stu- 
pidity of the Parliament. 

Lord North yesterday declared he should, during 
the recess, prepare to lay before the Parliament 
proposals of peace to be offered to the Americans ! 
" 1 trust we have force enough to bring forward an 






LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 195 

accommodation" They were his very words. Was 
ever proud, insolent nation sunk so low? Burke 
and Charles Fox told him the Administration 
thought of nothing but keeping their places ; and 
so they will, and the members their pensions, and 
the nation its infamy. Were I Franklin I would 
order the Cabinet Council to come to me at Paris 
with ropes about their necks, and then kick them 
back to St. James's. 

Well, madam, as I told Lord Ossory t' other day, 
I am satisfied, — Old England is safe, that is, 
America, whither the true English retired under 
Charles the First ; this is Nova Scotia, and I 
care not what becomes of it. 

I have just been at " Percy." x The four first acts 
are much better than I expected, and very ani- 
mated. There are good situations and several 
pretty passages, but not much nature. There is 
a fine speech of the heroine to her father, and a 
strange sermon against Crusades, that ends with a 
description of the Saviour, who died for our sins. 
The last act is very ill-conducted, unnatural, and 
obscure. Earl Douglas is a savage ruffian. Earl 
Percy is converted by the virtue of his mistress, and 
she is love and virtue in the supreme degree. There 
is a prologue and epilogue about fine ladies and 
fine gentlemen, and feathers and buckles, and I 
don't doubt every word of both Mr. Garrick's ; for 
they are common-place, and written for the upper 
gallery. It was very moderately performed, but 
one passage against the odious Scot Douglas was 
1 A tragedy by Hannah More. 



196 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

loudly applauded, and showed that the mob have 
no pensions. 

Our brave Administration have turned out Lord 
Jersey and Mr. Hopkins, which will certainly con- 
vince all America and all Europe that they are not 
afraid ; though I saw one of their tools to-day, who 
assured me they are, — nay, he said (and he is 
somebody) that if the Congress insists on the Min- 
istry being changed it must be. I do not believe 
the Congress will do them so much honor; but I 
answered, " Sir, if the Congress should make that 
condition, it will not be from caring about it, but to 
make the pacification impossible. I do not believe 
they care much more for the Opposition than for 
the Administration; but they must know that the 
Opposition could not, would not, grant terms that 
this Administration should refuse." 

Adieu, madam ! I am at last not sorry you 
have no son, and your daughters, I hope, will be 
married to Americans, and not in this dirty, despi- 
cable island ! 



LXIII. 

ENGLAND OFFERS PEACE. — RETROSPECTION. 

To Sir Horace Mann. 

Arlington Street, Feb. 18, 1778. 

I do not know how to word the following letter ; 

how to gain credit with you ! How shall I intimate 

to you that you must lower your topsails, waive 

your imperial dignity, and strike to the colors of 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 197 

the thirteen United Provinces of America? Do 
not tremble, and imagine that Washington has de- 
feated General Howe and driven him out of Phila- 
delphia, or that Gates has taken another army, or 
that Portsmouth is invested by an American fleet. 
No ; no military new event has occasioned this re- 
volution. The sacrifice has been made on the altar 
of Peace. Stop again : peace is not made, it is only 
implored, — and, I fear, only on this side of the 
Atlantic. In short, yesterday, February i*jth, a 
most memorable era, Lord North opened his Con- 
ciliatory Plan, — no partial, no collusive one. In 
as few words as I can use, it solicits peace with the 
States of America : it haggles on no terms ; it ac- 
knowledges the Congress, or anybody that pleases to 
treat ; it confesses errors, misinformation, ill-success, 
and impossibility of conquest ; it disclaims taxation, 
desires commerce, hopes for assistance, allows the 
independence of America, not verbally, yet virtually, 
and suspends hostilities till June, 1779. It does a 
little more : not verbally, but virtually, it confesses 
that the Opposition have been in the right from the 
beginning to the end. 

The warmest American cannot deny but these 
gracious condescensions are ample enough to con- 
tent that whole continent ; and yet, my friend, 
such accommodating facility had one defect, — it 
came too late. The treaty between the high and 
mighty States and France is signed ; and instead of 
peace, we must expect war with the high allies. 
The French army is come to the coast, and their 
officers here are recalled. 



198 LETTERS OF HORACE W A LP OLE. 

The House of Commons embraced the plan, 
and voted it, nemine contradicente. It is to pass 
both Houses with a rapidity that will do every- 
thing but overtake time past. All the world is in 
astonishment. As my letter will not set out till 
the day after to-morrow, I shall have time to tell 
you better what is thought of this amazing step. 

Feb. 20. 

In sooth I cannot tell you what is thought. No- 
body knows what to think. To leap at once from 
an obstinacy of four years to a total concession of 
everything ; to stoop so low, without hopes of being 
forgiven, — who can understand such a transforma- 
tion ? I must leave you in all your wonderment ; 
for the cloud is not dispersed. When it shall be, 
I doubt it will discover no serene prospect ! All 
that remains certain is, that America is not only 
lost, but given up. We must no longer give our- 
selves Continental airs ! I fear even our trident will 
find it has lost a considerable prong. 

I have lived long, but never saw such a day as 
last Tuesday ! From the first, I augured ill of this 
American war ; yet do not suppose that I boast of 
my penetration. Far was I from expecting such a 
conclusion ! Conclusion ! — y sommes nous ? Acts 
of Parliament have made a war, but cannot repeal 
one. They have provoked, not terrified ; and 
Washington and Gates have respected the Speaker's 
mace no more than Oliver Cromwell did. 

You shall hear as events arise. I disclaim all 
sagacity, and pretend to no foresight, — it is not an 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 199 

Englishman's talent. Even the second- sight of the 
Scots has proved a little purblind. 

Have you heard that Voltaire is actually in Paris ? 
Perhaps soon you will learn French news earlier 
than I can. 

What scenes my letters to you have touched on 
for eight and thirty years ! I arrived here at the eve 
of the termination of my father's happy reign. 
The rebellion, as he foresaw, followed ; and much 
disgrace. Another war ensued, with new disgraces. 
And then broke forth Lord Chatham's sun ; and 
all was glory and extensive empire. Nor tranquillity 
nor triumph are our lot now ! But adieu ! I shall 
probably write again before you have digested half 
the meditations this letter will have conjured up. 



LXIV. 

LORD CHATHAM'S LAST APPEARANCE IN THE HOUSE 
OF LORDS. 

To Sir Horace Mann. 

Thursday, April tyh, 1778. 
I am not going to announce more war than by 
my last; it seems to sleep, like a paroli at faro, 
and be reserved for another deal. Though I write 
oftener than usual, I have not a full cargo every 
time ; but I have two novel events to send you. 
The newspapers indeed anticipate many of my 
articles; but as I suppose you pay me the com- 



200 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

pliment of opening my letters before the Gazettes, 
I shall be the first to inform you, though but by 
five minutes. Lord Chatham has again appeared 
in the House of Lords, and probably for the last 
time. He was there on Tuesday, against the earn- 
est remonstrance of his physician; and, I think, 
only to make confusion worse confounded. He 
had intended to be very hostile to the Ministers, 
and yet to force himself into all their places by 
maintaining the sovereignty of America, to which 
none of the Opposition but his own few followers 
adhere ; and they cannot, like a strolling company 
in a barn, fill all the parts of a drama with four or 
five individuals. It appeared early in his speech 
that he had lost himself; he did not utter half he 
intended, and sat down : but, rising to reply to 
the Duke of Richmond, he fell down in an apoplec- 
tic fit, and was thought dead. They transported 
him into the Jerusalem Chamber and laid him 
on a table. In twenty minutes he recovered his 
senses and was carried to a messenger's house ad- 
joining, where he still remains. The scene was 
very affecting ; his two sons and son-in-law, Lord 
Mahon, were round him. The House paid a 
proper mark of respect by adjourning instantly. 

The same incertitude remains on our general 
situation. I pretend to tell you facts only, not 
reasonings ; and therefore will say no more now 
on public. One event, indeed, of Parliamentary 
complexion touches my private feelings very par- 
ticularly. The King has demanded a provision 
for his younger children, and has been so good 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 201 

as to add the Duke's to the list, — nobly too, both 
from the proportion of the allowance and the 
circumstances of the times. The King's sons are 
to have ten thousand a year each, his daughters 
six, Prince William eight, and Princess Sophia 
four. Thus both income and rank are ascer- 
tained. This is a great thorn extracted from all 
our sides, and I trust will have good influence on 
his Royal Highness's health. 

I was debarrasse'& (not in so comfortable a 
way) of my nephew. He has resumed the entire 
dominion of himself, and is gone into the country, 
and intends to command the militia. I have done 
all I could, when scarce anything was in my power, 
to prevent it ; but in vain. He has even asked to 
be a major-general, which officers of militia cannot 
be. What a humiliation to know he is thus ex- 
posing himself, and not dare to interpose ! Yet 
he is not ignorant of his situation. He said the 
other day to his Dalilah, speaking of Dr. Monro : 
"Patty, I like this doctor, don't you? We will 
have him next time." What an amazing compost 
of sense, insensibility, and frenzy ! Adieu ! 



202 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 



LXV. 

DEATH OF VOLTAIRE. — THE UNCERTAINTY OF 
WORLDLY MATTERS IN GENERAL. 

To Sir Horace Mann. 

Strawberry Hill, June 16, 1778. 

As I have just received yours of May 30th, I will 
begin to answer it, though I wrote to you on the 
first of this month, and think I shall not have enough 
additional to fill a whole letter yet. 

The public imagined there would have been some 
changes on the rising of the Parliament ; but they 
began and ended in the Law, and with bestowing 
the three vacant Garters. The Toulon squadron is 
certainly gone to America ; if to Boston, it is pos- 
sible with the immediate view only of getting sailors 
and two ships that are building there for France. 
If they can resist the temptation of burning Halifax, 
attacking Lord Howe or the West Indies, they are 
as great philosophers as Sir William Howe, who has 
twice gazed at General Washington. The last ac- 
count from that quarter had a little spirit in it ; 
they have burnt above forty American sloops and 
fry in the Delaware. For these last days there have 
been rumors of disposition in the Americans to 
treat ; but they do not gain much credit. Admiral 
Byron is sailed to America, and Admiral Keppel is 
at sea. At home we are spread with camps. This 
is all that amounts to facts, or to the eggs of facts. 
Sir William Howe is expected in a week or ten 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 203 

days. As the Parliament is not sitting, that topic 
may be suspended. Next we are to await the news 
of the reception of the commissioners ; perhaps their 
return. It would be easy to dilate reflections on all 
this suspense ; but I do not write to display my 
sagacity, but to inform you. 

The meteor of the reading world is dead, — Vol- 
taire. That throne is quite vacant. We shall see 
whether his old friend of Prussia x maintains that of 
war, or cedes it to a young Caesar. 2 He seems to me 
to be aiming at a more artful crown, — that of policy, 
— and in all probability will attain it ; at least, I am 
not much prejudiced yet in favor of his competitor. 
It is from beyond the Atlantic that the world per- 
haps will see a genius revive. They seem to set 
out with a politeness with which few empires have 
commenced. We have not shown ourselves quite 
so civilized. We hectored and called names, talked 
fire and sword, but have made more use of the first 
than of the second. Our Generals beg to be tried, 
and our Ministers not to be tried. This does not 
sound well when translated into other languages. 
For my part, who hold that Chance has much more 
to do in the affairs of the world than Wisdom, I wait 
to see what the first will ordain. This belief is a 
sovereign preservative against despondency. There 
have been very gloomy moments in my life ; but 
experience has shown me, either that events do not 
correspond to appearances, or that I have very little 
shrewdness ; and therefore I can resign the honor of 

1 Frederick III. 

2 The Emperor Joseph II. 



204 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

my penetration with satisfaction when my foresight 
augurs ill. If Lord Chatham knew that he should 
conquer the world, or Dr. Franklin that he should 
reduce us lower than Lord Chatham found us, I 
should respect their penetration indeed ! But with- 
out detracting from their spirit or abilities, I do not 
believe the first expected half the success he met 
with, or the latter half the incapacity that has been 
exerted against, and consequently for, him. 



LXVL 

INFATUATION OF ENGLAND. 

To the Rev. William Mason. 

July 4, 1778. 
Children break their playthings to see the inside 
of them. Pope thought superior beings looked on 
Newton but as a monkey of uncommon parts : would 
not he think that we have been like babies smashing 
an empire to see what it was made of? Truly I doubt 
whether there will be a whole piece left in three 
months ; the conduct bears due proportion to the 
incapacity, — you ought to be on the spot to believe 
it. When Keppel's messenger, Mr. Berkeley, arrived, 
neither the First Lord of the Admiralty nor the 
Secretary was to be found ; and now Mr. Keppel is 
returned, we learn that the East and West India 
fleets, worth four millions, are at stake, and the 
French frigates are abroad in pursuit of them. Yes- 
terday the merchants were with Lord North to press 



LETTERS OF HORACE W A LP OLE. 205 

Keppel might sail again against a superior fleet. 
Forty thousand men are on the coast, and transports 
assembling in every port, and nothing but incapacity 
and inability in all this, and not a grain of treachery. 

General Howe is arrived, and was graciously re- 
ceived. The agreeable news he brought is, that 
Clinton, for want of provisions, has abandoned Phila- 
delphia and marched through the Jerseys to New 
York without molestation, on condition of not de- 
stroying Philadelphia. The Congress has ratified 
the treaty with France, and intend to treat the com- 
missioners de haut en bas, — unless you choose to 
believe the "Morning Post," who says five provinces 
declare for peace. I told you lately my curiosity to 
know what is to be left to us at a general peace. 
The wisest thing the Ministers could do would be to 
ask that question incontinently. I am persuaded 
in the present apathy that the nation would be per- 
fectly pleased, let the terms be what they would. A 
series of disasters may spoil this good humor, and 
there often wants but a man to fling a stone to 
spread a conflagration. The Treasury is not rich 
enough at present to indemnify the losers of four 
millions; the stockholders are two hundred and 
forty thousand and the fraction forty thousand 
would make an ugly mob. In short, tempests that 
used to be composed of irascible elements never 
had more provocation than they are likely to 
have, — such is the glimpse of our present horizon, 
Now to your letter. 

If your Mecsenas's 1 fame is overwhelmed in Lord 
1 Lord Holdernesse, who had recently died. 



206 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

Chatham's and Voltaire's, it is already revenged on 
the latter's. Madame du Deffand's letter of to-day 
says he is already forgotten. La belle poule has 
obliterated him, but probably will have a contrary 
effect on Lord Chatham. All my old friend has told 
me of Voltaire's death is that the excessive fatigues 
he underwent by his journey to Paris, and by the 
bustle he made with reading his play to the actors 
and hearing them repeat it, and by going to it, and 
by the crowds that flocked to him, — in one word, 
the agitation of so much applause at eighty-four, 
— threw him into a strangury, for which he took so 
much laudanum that his frame could not resist all, 
and he fell a martyr to his vanity. Nay, Garrick, 
who is above twenty years younger, and as full as 
vain, would have been choked with such doses of 
flattery, — though he would like to die the death. 

You, who are not apt to gape for incense, may 
be believed when you speak well of "Sappho." I 
am sorry I must wait for the sight till Lord Harcourt 
proclaims summer. I enjoy the present, which I 
remember none like ; but even this is clouded by 
the vexation of seeing this lovely island spoiled and 
sold to shame. I look at our beautiful improve- 
ments, and sigh to think that they have seen their 
best days. Did you feel none of these melancholy 
reflections at Wentworth Castle? I wrote the Earl 
[Strafford] a letter two days ago that will not please 
him ; but can one always contain one's chagrin when 
one's country is ruined by infatuation? No, we never 
can revive. We killed the hen that laid the golden 
eggs. The term Great Britain will be a jest. My 



LETTERS OF HORACE V/ALPOLE. 207 

English pride is wounded, yet there is one comforta- 
ble thought remains, — when Liberty was abandoned 
by her sons here, she animated her genuine children, 
and inspired them to chastise the traitor Scots that 
attacked her. They have made a blessed harvest 
of their machinations. If there is a drachm of sense 
under a crown, a Scot hereafter will be reckoned 
pestilential. Methinks the word Prerogative should 
never sound very delightful in this island ; attempt 
to extend it, and its fairest branches wither and drop 
off. What has an army of fifty thousand men fight- 
ing for sovereignty achieved in America ? Retreated 
from Boston, retreated from Philadelphia, laid down 
their arms at Saratoga, and lost thirteen provinces ! 
Nor is the measure yet full ! Such are the conse- 
quences of our adopting new legislators, new histo- 
rians, new doctors ! Locke and Sidney, for Humes, 
Johnsons, and Dalrymples ! When the account is 
made up and a future Historiographer Royal casts 
up debtor and creditor, I hope he will please to 
state the balance between the last war/<?r America 
and the present against it. The advantages of that 
we know, — Quebec, the Havannah, Martinico, Gua- 
daloupe, the East Indies, the French and Spanish 
fleets destroyed, etc. ; all the bills per contra are 
not yet come in. Our writers have been disput- 
ing for these hundred and sixty-six years on Whig 
and Tory principles. Their successors, who I sup- 
pose will continue the controversy, will please to 
allow at least that if the Ministers of both parties 
were equally complaisant when in power, the splen- 
dor of the Crown (I say nothing of the happiness 



208 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

of the people, which is never taken into the account) 
has constantly been augmented by Whig administra- 
tions, and has faded (and then and now a little 
more) when Tories have governed. The reason is 
as plain : Whig principles are founded on sense ; a 
Whig may be a fool, a Tory must be so. The con- 
sequence is plain : a W T hig when a Minister may 
abandon his principles, but he will retain his sense, 
and will therefore not risk the felicity of his pos- 
terity by sacrificing everything to selfish views. A 
Tory attaining power hurries to establish despotism : 
the honor, the trade, the wealth, the peace of the 
nation, all are little to him in comparison of the 
despotic will of his master. But are not you glad I 
write on small paper? 



LXVII. 

GENIUS AND VILLANY OF CHATTERTON. 

To the Rev. William Mason. 

Strawberry Hill, July 24, 1778. 

I have been two days in town. What I could 
collect was, that the Congress will not deign to send 
any answer to the commissioners ; that Lord Howe 
refused to act as one of them, and that the bear 
and the monkey have quarrelled ; that the Ameri- 
cans have sent an expedition to Florida, and that 
Washington's army is reduced to seven thousand 
and is very sickly. One should think the two last 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 209 

circumstances were invented to balance the others ; 
but surely our Ministers ought at last to exaggerate 
on the other side, that things may seem to turn out 
better than was expected, rather than worse, as hith- 
erto they have contrived to make them appear. 

France has not declared war; and if the Brest 
fleet did sail, it was not a stone's throw. I imagine 
they wait for news of D'Estains, before they take 
the last step, or they will draw Keppel aside, and 
then set forth an embarkation. I sometimes hope 
peace is not impossible. It cannot be half so bad 
as a new war in our present situation ; it would at 
least give us time to prepare for war. We are come 
to the necessity of fortifying the island, or it may 
be lost in a single battle. When we have no longer 
the superiority at sea, it would be madness — it 
would, it is, madness to have no resource, no spot 
where to make a stand. But what signify my poli- 
tics? Who will listen to them? 

It is not unlucky that I have got something to 
divert my mind ; for I can think on other subjects 
when I have them. I am at last forced to enter 
into the history of the supposed Rowley's Poems. 
I must write on it, nay, what is more, print, not 
directly, controversially, but in my own defence. 
Some jackanapes at Bristol (I don't know who) has 
published Chatterton's Works; and I suppose to 
provoke me to tell the story, accuses me of treating 
that marvellous creature with contempt ; which hav- 
ing supposed, contrary to truth, he invites his read- 
ers to feel indignation at me. It has more than 
once before been insinuated that his disappointment 
14 



2IO LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

from me contributed to his horrid fate. You know 
how gently I treated him. He was a consummate 
villain, and had gone enormous lengths before he 
destroyed himself. It would be cruel indeed if one 
was to be deemed the assassin of every rogue that 
miscarries in attempting to cheat one ; in short, the 
attack is now too direct not to be repelled. Two 
months ago I did draw up an account of my share 
in that affair. That Narrative and an Answer to 
this insult, which I wrote last night, I will publish, 
signed with my name, but not advertised by it. It 
will reach all those that take part in the controversy, 
and I do not desire it should go farther. These 
things I will have transcribed, and ask your leave 
to send you before they go to the press. I am in 
no hurry to publish, nor is the moment a decent 
one ; yet I embrace it, as I shall be the less talked 
over. I hate controversy, yet to be silent now, 
would be interpreted guilt; and it is impossible to 
be more innocent than I was in that affair. Being 
innocent, I take care not to be angry. Mr. Tyr- 
whitt, one of the enthusiasts to Rowley, has re- 
canted, and published against the authenticity of 
the Poems. The new publisher of Chatterton's un- 
disputed works seems to question the rest too, so 
his attack on me must be mere impertinent curios- 
ity. One satisfaction will arise from all this : the 
almost incredible genius of Chatterton will be as- 
certained. He had generally genuine powers of 
poetry ; often wit, and sometimes natural humor. 
I have seen reams of his writing, besides what is 
printed. He had a strong vein of satire too, and 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 211 

very irascible resentment ; yet the poor soul perished 
before he was nineteen ! He had read, and written, 
as if he was fourscore ; yet it cannot be discovered 
when or where. He had no more principles than 
if he had been one of all our late Administrations. 
He was an instance that a complete genius and a 
complete rogue can be formed before a man is of 
age. The world has generally the honor of their 
education, but it is not necessary ; you see by 
Chatterton that an individual could be as perfect 
as a senate ! Adieu ! 



LXVIII. 

EXPRESSION OF FILIAL AFFECTION AND FAMILY 
PRIDE. 

To the Earl of Orford. 1 

Strawberry Hill, Oct. 5, 1778. 
My dear Lord, — Your Lordship is very good 
in thanking me for what I could not claim any 

1 Written in answer to the following letter from his 
nephew. 

To the Hon. Horace Walpole. 

Eriswell, Oct. 1, 1778. 

Sir, — I write one line to thank you for your ready concurrence 
in the measures I am now pursuing to settle the affairs of the family 
and to satisfy Sir Robert Walpole's creditors, and beg leave to 
trouble you to make my compliments and to return my thanks also 
to Sir Edward. 

If you have a mind to revisit your Penates again, and to see the 
alterations I am making in both fronts (I will not call them improve- 
ments), I shall be extremely glad to have your company at Hough- 
ton on Monday fortnight, the 19th of October, where I purpose 
staying a week. I am, sir, with great regard, your most obedient 
and humble servant, Orford. 



212 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

thanks ; as in complying with your request, and 
assisting you to settle your affairs, according to 
my father's will, was not only my duty, but to pro- 
mote your service and benefit, to re-establish the 
affairs of my family, and to conform myself to the 
views of the excellent man, the glory of human na- 
ture, who made us all what we are, has been con- 
stantly one of the principal objects of my whole 
life. If my labors and wishes have been crowned 
with small success, it has been owing to my own in- 
ability in the first place, and next to tenderness, and 
to the dirt and roguery of wretches below my no- 
tice. For your Lordship, I may presume to say, 
I have spared no thought, industry, solicitude, ap- 
plication, or even health, when I had the care of 
your affairs. What I did, and could have done, 
and should have done, if you had not thought fit 
to prefer a most conceited and worthless fellow, I 
can demonstrate by reams of paper, that may, one 
day or other, prove what I say ; and which, if I 
have not yet done, it proceeds from the same ten- 
derness that I have ever had for your Lordship's 
tranquillity and repose. To acquiesce afterwards 
in the arrangement you have proposed to me, is 
small merit indeed. My honor is much dearer 
to me than fortune, and to contribute to your Lord- 
ship's enjoying your fortune with credit and satis- 
faction, is a point I would have purchased with far 
greater compliances ; for, my Lord, as I flatter my- 
self that I am not thought an interested man, so all 
who know me know, that to see the lustre of my 
family restored to the consideration to which it was 






LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 213 

raised by Sir Robert Walpole, shining in you, and 
transmitted to his and your descendants, was the 
only ambition that ever actuated me. No personal 
advantage entered into those views; and if I say 
thus much of myself with truth, I owe still greater 
justice to my brother, who has many more virtues 
than I can pretend to, and is as incapable of form- 
ing any mean and selfish wishes as any man upon 
earth. We are both old men now, and without 
sons to inspire us with future visions. We wish to 
leave your Lordship in as happy and respectable 
situation as you were born to ; and we have both 
given you all the proof in our power, by acquiescing 
in your proposal immediately. 

For me, my Lord, I should with pleasure accept 
the honor of waiting on you at Houghton at the 
time you mention, if my lameness and threats of 
the gout did not forbid my taking so long a journey 
at this time of the year. At sixty-one, it would not 
become me to talk of another year : perhaps I may 
never go to Houghton again, till I go thither for- 
ever; but without affectation of philosophy, even 
the path to that journey will be sweetened to me 
if I leave Houghton the flourishing monument of 
one of the best Ministers that ever blest this once 
nourishing country. 

I am, my dear Lord, yours most affectionately. 



214 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 



LXIX. 

GRIEF AT THE SALE OT THE HOUGHTON PICTURES. 
— DEPRECIATION OF GARRICK. 

To the Countess of Ossory. 

Feb. i, 1779. 

When Lord Ossory is in town, madam, I do not 
presume to think of writing. He is more in the 
world, and hears everything sooner than I do ; nor 
would it be fair to him, to divide a moment of your 
time with him. However, there were such inter- 
esting topics in the letter I had the honor of re- 
ceiving this evening, that I must answer it directly. 
But I shall waive the first subject, which concerns 
myself, to come to the last, that touches your Lady- 
ship ; and can I but admire your goodness in think- 
ing of me, when an angel is inoculated ? You must 
now continue it, for you have promised I shall hear 
how she goes on. Sweet little love ! you must be 
anxious, though inoculation now can scarce be 
called a hazard. It is as sure as a cheat of win- 
ning, though a strange run of luck may once in two 
thousand times disappoint him. 

The pictures at Houghton I hear, and I fear, are 
sold : what can I say ? I do not like even to think 
on it. It is the most signal mortification to my 
idolatry for my father's memory that it could re- 
ceive. It is stripping the temple of his glory and 
of his affection. A madman excited by rascals has 
burned his Ephesus. I must never cast a thought 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 215 

towards Norfolk more, nor will hear my nephew's 
name if I can avoid it. Him I can only pity; 
though it is strange he should recover any degree 
of sense, and never any of feeling ! I could have 
saved my family, but cannot repent the motives that 
bound my hands. If any unhappy lunatic is ever 
the better for my conduct and example, it is prefer- 
able to a collection of pictures. 

Yes, madam, I do think the pomp of Garrick's 
funeral perfectly ridiculous. It is confounding the 
immense space between pleasing talents and na- 
tional services. What distinctions remain for a 
patriot hero when the most solemn have been 
showered on a player? But when a great empire 
is on its decline, one symptom is, there being more 
eagerness on trifles than on essential objects. Shak- 
speare, who wrote when Burleigh counselled and 
Nottingham fought, was not rewarded and hon- 
ored like Garrick, who only acted when — indeed I 
do not know who has counselled and who has fought. 

I do not at all mean to detract from Garrick's 
merit, who was a real genius in his way, and who, 
I believe, was never equalled in both tragedy and 
comedy. Still, I cannot think that acting, however 
perfectly, what others have written, is one of the 
most astonishing talents ; yet I will own as fairly 
that Mrs. Porter and Mademoiselle Dumesnil have 
struck me so much as even to reverence them. 
Garrick never affected me quite so much as those 
two actresses, and some few others in particular 
parts : as Quin, in FalstarT; King, in Lord Ogleby ; 
Mrs. Pritchard, in Maria, in the " Nonjuror; " Mrs. 



2i6 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

Clive, in Mrs. Cadwallader ; and Mrs. Abington, in 
Lady Teazle. They all seemed the very persons. 
I suppose that in Garrick I thought I saw more of 
his art ; yet his Lear, Richard, Hotspur (which the 
town had not taste enough to like), Kitely, and 
Ranger, were as capital and perfect as action could 
be. In declamation, I confess, he never charmed 
me : nor could he be a gentleman ; his Lord Town- 
ley and Lord Hastings were mean, — but then too 
the parts are indifferent, and do not call for a 
master's exertion. 

I should shock Garrick's devotees if I uttered all 
my opinion : I will trust your Ladyship with it, — 
it is, that Le Texier is twenty times the genius. 
What comparison between the powers that do the 
fullest justice to a single part, and those that in- 
stantaneously can fill a whole piece, and transform 
themselves with equal perfection into men and wo- 
men, and pass from laughter to tears, and make 
you shed the latter at both? Garrick, when he 
made one laugh, was not always judicious, though 
excellent. What idea did his Sir John Brute give 
of a surly husband? His Bayes was no less enter- 
taining ; but it was a Garretteer-bard. Old Gibber 
preserved the solemn coxcomb, and was the carica- 
ture of a great poet, as the part was designed to be. 

Half I have said, I know, is heresy ; but fashion 
had gone to excess, though very rarely with so 
much reason. Applause had turned his head, and 
yet he was never content even with that prodi- 
gality. His jealousy and envy were unbounded. 
He hated Mrs. Clive till she quitted the stage, and 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 217 

then cried her up to the skies to depress Mrs. 
Abington. He did not love Mrs. Pritchard, — and 
with more reason ; for there was more spirit and 
originality in her Beatrice than in his Benedick. 

But if the town did not admire his acting more 
than it deserved, which indeed in general it was 
difficult to do, what do you think, madam, of its 
prejudice even for his writings? What stuff was his 
Jubilee Ode, and how paltry his Prologues and Epi- 
logues ! I have always thought that he was just the 
counterpart of Shakspeare, — this, the first of writers 
and an indifferent actor; that, the first of actors 
and a woful author. Posterity would believe me, 
who will see only his writings ; and who will see 
those of another modern idol far less deservedly 
enshrined, — Dr. Johnson. I have been saying 
this morning that the latter deals so much in triple 
tautology, or the fault of repeating the same sense 
in three different phrases, that I believe it would 
be possible, taking the groundwork for all three, 
to make one of his " Ramblers " into three different 
papers that should all have exactly the same pur- 
port and meaning, but in different phrases. It 
would be a good trick for somebody to produce 
one and read it ; a second would say, " Bless me ! 
I have this very paper in my pocket, but in quite 
other diction \ " and so a third. 

Our lord has been so good as to call on me again, 
and 'found me ; but I take for granted will make 
his little Gertrude a visit to-morrow, though prob- 
ably not bring your Ladyship with him till she is 
recovered. I am in no pain, even for her beauty. 



218 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

As the court-martial is likely to end this week, I 
suppose the parliamentary campaign will be warmly 
renewed the next ; but what campaign will restore 
this country to its greatness? It is blotted out of 
the list of mighty empires, and they who love pro- 
cessions may make a splendid funeral for it ! But 
indeed it was buried last year with Lord Chatham, 
at whose interment there were not half the noble 
coaches that attended Garrick's ! 



LXX. 

NEW DIFFICULTIES IN THE CONDUCT OF THE 
AMERICAN WAR. 

To the Countess of Aylesbury. 

Saturday Night y July 10, 1779. 

I could not thank your Ladyship before the post 
went out to-day, as I was getting into my chaise to 
go and dine at Carshalton with my cousin Thomas 
Walpole when I received your kind inquiry about 
my eye. It is quite well again, and I hope the 
next attack of the gout will be anywhere rather than 
in that quarter. 

I did not expect Mr. Conway would think of 
returning just now. As you have lost both Mrs. 
Darner and Lady William Campbell, I do not see 
why your Ladyship should not go to Goodwood. 

The Baroness's increasing peevishness does not 
surprise me. When people will not weed their own 
minds, they are apt to be overrun with nettles. 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 219 

She knows nothing of politics, and no wonder talks 
nonsense about them. It is silly to wish three 
nations had but one neck ; but it is ten times more 
absurd to act as if it was so, which the government 
has done, — ay, and forgetting, too, that it has not 
a scimitar large enough to sever that neck, which 
they have in effect made one. It is past the time, 
madam, of making conjectures. How can one 
guess whither France and Spain will direct a blow 
that is in their option? I am rather inclined to 
think that they will have patience to ruin us in 
detail. Hitherto France and America have carried 
their points by that manoeuvre. Should there be 
an engagement at sea, and the French and Spanish 
fleets, by their great superiority, have the advantage, 
one knows not what might happen. Yet, though 
there are such large preparations making on the 
French coast, I do not much expect a serious in- 
vasion, as they are sure they can do us more 
damage by a variety of other attacks, where we 
can make little resistance. Gibraltar and Jamaica 
can but be the immediate objects of Spain. Ireland 
is much worse guarded than this island, — nay, we 
must be undone by our expense, should the summer 
pass without any attempt. My cousin thinks they 
will try to destroy Portsmouth and Plymouth ; but 
I have seen nothing in the present French Ministry 
that looks like bold enterprise. We are much 
more adventurous, that set everything to the hazard ; 
but there are such numbers of baro?iesses that both 
talk and act with passion that one would think 
the nation had lost its senses. 



2 20 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

Everything has miscarried that has been under- 
taken, and the worse we succeed, the more is 
risked ; yet the nation is not angry ! How can 
one conjecture during such a delirium? I some- 
times almost think I must be in the wrong to be of 
so contrary an opinion to most men ; yet when 
every misfortune that has happened had been fore- 
told by a few, why should I not think I have been 
in the right? Has not almost every single event 
that has been announced as prosperous proved a 
gross falsehood, and often a silly one? Are we 
not at this moment assured that Washington cannot 
possibly amass an army of above eight thousand 
men? And yet Clinton, with twenty thousand men, 
and with the hearts, as we are told, too, of three 
parts of the colonies, dares not show his teeth with- 
out the walls of New York ! Can I be in the wrong 
in not believing what is so contradictory to my 
senses? We could not conquer America when it 
stood alone ; then France supported it, and we 
did not mend the matter. To make it still easier, 
we have driven Spain into the alliance. Is this 
wisdom? Would it be presumption, even if one 
were single, to think that we must have the worst 
in such a contest? Shall I be like the mob, and 
expect to conquer France and Spain, and then 
thunder upon America? Nay, but the higher mob 
do not expect such success. They would not be 
so angry at the house of Bourbon, if not morally 
certain that those kings destroy all our passionate 
desire and expectation of conquering America. | We 
bullied and threatened and begged, and nothing 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 221 

would do. Yet independence was still the word. 
Now we rail at the two monarchs ; and when they 
have banged us, we shall sue to them as humbly as 
we did to the Congress. All this my senses, such 
as they are, tell me has been and will be the case. 
What is worse, all Europe is of the same opinion ; 
and though forty thousand bai'onesses may be ever 
so angry, I venture to prophesy that we shall make 
but a very foolish figure whenever we are so lucky 
as to obtain a peace ; and posterity, that may have 
prejudices of its own, will still take the liberty to 
pronounce that its ancestors were a woful set of 
politicians \ from the year 1774 to — I wish I 
knew when. v 

If I might advise, I would recommend Mr. Burrell 
to command the fleet in the room of Sir Charles 
Hardy. The fortune of the Burrells is powerful 
enough to baffle calculation. Good night, madam ! 

P. S. — I have not written to Mr. Conway since 
this day sevennight, not having a teaspoonful of 
news to send him. I will beg your Ladyship to tell 
him so. 



222 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

LXXI. 

EUROPE PAYING ITS DEBTS TO AMERICA. 

To Sir Horace Mann. 

Berkeley Square, Dec. 31, 1780. 

I have received and thank you much for the 
curious history 1 of the Count and Countess of 
Albany ; what a wretched conclusion of a wretched 
family ! Surely no royal race was ever so drawn 
to the dregs ! The other Countess [Orford] you 
mention seems to approach still nearer to dissolu- 
tion. Her death a year or two ago might have 
prevented the sale of the pictures, — not that I 
know it would. Who can say what madness in the 
hands of villany would or would not have done? 
Now I think her dying would only put more into 
the reach of rascals. But I am indifferent what 
they do; nor, but thus occasionally, shall I throw 
away a thought on that chapter. 

All chance of accommodation with Holland is 
vanished. Count Welderen and his wife departed 
this morning. All they who are to gain by priva- 
teers and captures are delighted with a new field of 
plunder. Piracy is more practicable than victory. 

1 The Pretender's wife complaining to the Great Duke of 
her husband's beastly behavior to her, that prince contrived 
her escape into a convent, and thence sent her to Rome, 
where she was protected by the Cardinal of York, her 
husband's brother. 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 223 

Not being an admirer of wars, I shall reserve my 
feux de joie for peace. 

My letters, I think, are rather eras than journals. 
Three days ago commenced another date, — the 
establishment of a family for the Prince of Wales. 
I do not know all the names, and fewer of the faces 
that compose it ; nor intend. I, who kissed the 
hand of George I., have no colt's tooth for the 
court of George IV. Nothing is so ridiculous as 
an antique face in a juvenile drawing-room. I be- 
lieve that they who have spirits enough to be absurd 
in their decrepitude are happy, for they certainly 
are not sensible of their folly; but I, who have 
never forgotten what I thought in my youth of such 
superannuated idiots, dread nothing more than 
misplacing myself in my old age. In truth, I feel 
no such appetite ; and excepting the young of my 
own family, about whom I am interested, I have 
mighty small satisfaction in the company of pos- 
terity, — for so the present generation seem to me. 
I would contribute anything to their pleasure but 
what cannot contribute to it, — my own presence. 
Alas ! how many of this age are swept away before 
me ; six thousand have been mowed down at once 
by the late hurricane at Barbadoes alone ! How 
Europe is paying the debts it owes to America ! 
Were I a poet, I would paint hosts of Mexicans and 
Peruvians crowding the shores of Styx, and insult- 
ing the multitudes of the usurpers of their continent 
that have been sending themselves thither for these 
five or six years. The poor Africans, too, have no 
call to be merciful to European ghosts. Those 



224 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

miserable slaves have just now seen whole crews of 
men-of-war swallowed by the late hurricane. 

We do not yet know the extent of our loss. . You 
would think it very slight if you saw how little 
impression it makes on a luxurious capital. An 
overgrown metropolis has less sensibility than mar- 
ble ; nor can it be conceived by those not con- 
versant in one. I remember hearing what diverted 
me then : a young gentlewoman, a native of our 
rock, St. Helena, and who had never stirred beyond 
it, being struck with the emotion occasioned there 
by the arrival of one or two of our China ships, said 
to the captain, " There must be a great solitude in 
London as often as the China ships come away ! " 
Her imagination could not have compassed the 
idea if she had been told that six years of war, the 
absence of an army of fifty or sixty thousand men 
and of all our squadrons, and a new debt of many, 
many millions, would not make an alteration in the 
receipts at the door of a single theatre in London. 
I do not boast of or applaud this profligate apathy. 
When pleasure is our business, our business is never 
our pleasure ; and if four wars cannot awaken us, 
we shall die in a dream ! 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 225 

LXXII. 

JOHNSON'S CRITICISM ON GRAY. — GIBBON'S QUARREL. 
To the Rev. William Mason. 

Berkeley Square, Jan. 27, 17S1. 

Mr. Gilpin has sent me his book and dedication. 
I thank you for the latter being so moderate, yet 
he talks of my researches, which makes me smile ; 
I know, as Gray would have said, how little I have 
researched, and what slender pretensions are mine 
to so pompous a term. A propos to Gray, John- 
son's Life, or rather criticism on his Odes, is come 
out, — a most wretched, dull, tasteless, verbal criti- 
cism ; yet timid too. But he makes amends, - — he 
admires Thomson and Akenside, and Sir Richard 
Blackmore, and has reprinted Dennis's " Criticism 
on Cato," to save time and swell his pay. In short, 
as usual, he has proved that he has no more ear 
than taste. Mrs. Montagu and all her Msenades 
intend to tear him limb from limb for despising 
their moppet Lord Lyttelton. 

You will be diverted to hear that Mr. Gibbon has 
quarrelled with me. He lent me his second volume 
in the middle of November. I returned it with a 
most civil panegyric. He came for more incense. 
I gave it ; but, alas ! with too much sincerity, I 
added, " Mr. Gibbon, I am sorry you should have 
pitched on so disgusting a subject as the Constanti- 
nopoiitan History. There is so much of the Arians 
iS 



2 26 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

and Eunomians and semi-Pelagians, and there is 
such a strange contrast between Roman and Gothic 
manners, and so little harmony between a Consul 
Sabinus and a Ricimer, duke of the palace, that 
though you have written the story as well as it 
could be written, I fear few will have patience to 
read it." He colored ; all his round features 
squeezed themselves into sharp angles, he screwed 
up his button mouth, and rapping his snuff-box, 
said, " It had never been put together before," — 
so well he meant to add, but gulped it. He 
meant so well certainly ; for Tillemont, whom he 
quotes in every page, has done the very thing. 
Well, from that hour to this I have never seen him, 
though he used to call once or twice a week, nor 
has sent me the third volume, as he promised. I 
well knew his vanity, even about his ridiculous face 
and person, but thought he had too much sense to 
avow it so palpably. The " History " is admirably 
written, especially in the characters of Julian and 
Athanasius, in both which he has piqued himself on 
impartiality; but the style is far less sedulously 
enamelled than the first volume, and there is flattery 
to the Scots that would choke anything but Scots, 
who can gobble feathers as readily as thistles. 
David Hume and Adam Smith are legislators and 
sages ; but the homage is intended for his patron, 
Lord Loughborough. 

So much for literature and its fops ! except what 
interests me a thousand times more, and which I 
kept for the bonne bonche, your " Fresnoy " and 
fourth " Garden ; " I shall certainly ask for the former 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 227 

the instant I return (for I go to-morrow to Park 
Place, to see Mr. Conway, who cannot yet get to 
town), but not to interfere a moment with Sir 
Joshua Reynolds, who will execute his task so well. 
I long too for the " Garden." I beg to recom- 
mend a note to you : last year a man at Turnham 
Green fixed up a board with this notice, — Ready 
made Temples sold here. I would put over the con- 
vocation, Ready made Priests sold here. The Turn- 
hamite now sells only curricles and whiskeys. 

If my gazette is long, remember you ordered me 
to amuse Mr. Palgrave. I am glad you have him, 
and will do anything I can to fix him with you ; 
pray assure him how much I am his. I can say 
no more, for I have not left half room to thank you 
for your very kind promise of coming to me in the 
spring. It amply compensates my disappointment 
of seeing you here ; here I only get a snatch of you 
for an instant, nowhere I have enough of you. 
And which I lament more, for I am not selfish, the 
world has not enough of you, — you know what I 
mean. 

LXXIII. 

SELF-CRITICISM AS AN AUTHOR. 

To John Henderson, Esq. 1 

Berkeley Square, April 16, 1781. 
Ever since I had the pleasure of seeing you here, 
I have been uneasy at what you told me, of having 
1 A celebrated actor, sometimes called the Irish Crichton. 



228 LETTERS OF HORACE W A LP OLE. 

seen an extract of my tragedy 1 in a work going 
to be published. Though I was so imprudent as to 
print and give away some copies of it, and conse- 
quently exposed myself to the risk of what is 
happening, yet I heartily wish I could prevent that 
publication, as it will occasion discourse about the 
play, which is disgusting from the subject, and 
absurd from being totally unfit for the stage, — a 
reason which, could I have succeeded better, ought 
still to have restrained me from undertaking it. 

May I take the liberty of asking you if you think 
it could be stopped? I should be willing to pay 
for my folly. Do not answer me by a compliment, 
nor tell me, as civility may perhaps dictate, that it 
would be pity to deprive the public of such a jewel. 
Pray do not think that I seek for, or should like, 
such an hyperbole. I use the word "jewel " most 
ironically, and do not imagine that a pebble with a 
great flaw through the whole can have much lustre. 
There is no affectation in this request. I have be- 
trayed but too much vanity in printing what I knew 
had such capital faults ; but I am too old now not to 
fear disgusting the public more than I can flatter 
myself with its approbation. Yet the impression of 
only a small number of copies at first, will prove 
that when several years younger, I was conscious of 
the imperfections of my tragedy, and gave them 
only to those who I knew were partial to me. 
There are many defects in the execution as well as 
in the subject ; but when the materials are ill 
chosen, what would it avail to retouch the fashion? 
1 The Mysterious Mother. 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 229 

Nor, though I have sometimes written verses, did I 
ever think that I was born a poet. 

In short, sir, I most sincerely wish to have the 
publication of any part of the play prevented, and 
you will oblige me exceedingly if you can assist me. 
Perhaps it is asking too great a favor when I beg 
you to take that trouble ; if it is, only let me know 
the editor, and I will undertake the task myself. 

I am, sir, with great regard, your obedient, hum- 
ble servant. 



LXXIV. 

DIFFERS WITH LADY OSSORY ON THE AMERICAN 
QUESTION. 

To the Countess of Ossory. 

Strawberry Hill, Nov. 6, 1781. 

I believe I am very dull, or quite blinded by 
prejudice, for I confess I do not feel the force of 
your Ladyship's arguments. Are men in the right 
to take up arms in self-defence, and in the wrong 
to declare themselves independent? Is resistance 
by force a thing indifferent, and the declaration in 
words a crime? Methinks by that rule all who 
joined the Prince of Orange were justifiable, but 
ceased to be so the moment King James was de- 
throned. Thus men ought to offend a king, but 
never to punish him ! I believe their Majesties 
would agree to that compromise. 

I can as little subscribe to the position that it is 



230 LETTERS OF HORACE W A LP OLE. 

the duty of an officer to obey his king, whatever 
may be the officer's opinions. Were that maxim 
true, no conscientious man can accept a commission 
if it dissolves the obligation of his conscience. 
Those very loyal instruments, the bells of a parish 
church, do allow a precedence to God. Fear God, 
honor the King. But I am talking politics and argu- 
ing, — two things I do not love. I am almost afraid 
to tell you news on that subject, as I doubt your 
Ladyship is less and less likely to recover your 
share of sovereignty over America. Lord Graham 
and Lord Sefton, who have been in town, tell me 
that the accounts brought by Colonel Conway are 
very bad indeed. I did see him himself on Satur- 
day at Ditton, on his way to Windsor ; but he was so 
discreet as to say nothing but that what he brought 
was not very good, — that the French have thirty- 
seven ships, and we twenty-three ; that the former 
have landed four thousand men, and evacuated 
Rhode Island, and taken two of our best frigates 
(the papers say three) . But it is not true that two 
regiments have been cut to pieces, for the Forty- 
fifth, one of the named, is in England. He did say 
that your friend Lord Cornwallis has the back country 
open to him, and he did not add, what Lord Sefton 
tells me is said, that he had provisions but for six 
weeks. We shall close, I believe and hope, Madam, 
in wishing an end to this destruction of the species ; 
nor can the most loyal, I suppose, think that even 
the dependence of America was worth purchasing 
at the expense of thousands of lives, of forty millions 
of money, of the sovereignty of the sea, and of the 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 231 

loss of America itself. We were naturally trades- 
men, and had better have borne a few affronts than 
asserted the point of honor at so dear a rate. 

It is very far from true, madam, that I write 
either prologue or epilogue to the " Count of Nar- 
bonne." I could no more compose twenty verses 
than I could dance a hornpipe. My faculties are 
as delabrees as my limbs, and these are deplorable. 
My nerves are so shattered that the clapping of a 
door makes me tremble ; and this poor hand that 
is writing to you has long lost the use of three of 
its joints, and I fear will quite desert me. I have 
now, and have had all the summer, the gout in 
the fourth finger. Thus my person is as antiquated 
as my political opinions ! 

I have not seen Mr. Selwyn for half a century. 
He has the mal a propos almost as strongly as the 
a propos. Others, with more malice, say they per- 
ceive a likeness to the Lord William. Miss Lloyd 
is full as like to Lady Sarah. Miss Bunbury has 
a great deal of the Lennoxes, — not so handsome, 
but with a much prettier person than any of the 
females of the family. 

Genealogist as I am, I cannot make out, madam, 
how Miss Sackville is Lord Mansfield's niece. You 
say you do not entirely believe that his Lordship 
gave away his niece. Cela me passe. To weep at 
weddings I know is of ancient custom, as much as 
double entendres, — a ceremonial, the former, of 
which I never knew the origin. The more and the 
longer a fashion prevails, the less sense there com- 
monly is in it. Thence solutionists, like etymolo- 



232 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

gists, seldom hit on the true foundation, both 
hunting for some meaning. 

I recollect how prolix my last was ; and though 
you are too civil to tell me, madam, of that other 
symptom of my dotage, I am aware of it myself, 
and wish you good-night. 



LXXV. 

ON THE SURRENDER OF CORNWALLIS AT YORKTOWN. 

To the Earl of Strafford. 

Berkeley Square, Nov. 27, 1781. 
Each fresh mark of your Lordship's kindness and 
friendship calls on me for thanks and an answer; 
every other reason would enjoin me silence. I not 
only grow so old, but the symptoms of age increase 
so fast, that as they advise me to keep out of the 
world, that retirement makes me less fit to be in- 
forming or entertaining. The philosophers who 
have sported on the verge of the tomb, or they 
who have affected to sport in the same situation, 
both tacitly implied that it was not out of their 
thoughts ; and however dear what we are going to 
leave may be, all that is not particularly dear must 
cease to interest us much. If those reflections 
blend themselves with our gayest thoughts, must 
not their hue grow more dusky when public mis- 
fortunes and disgrace cast a general shade? The 
age, it is true, soon emerges out of every gloom, 
and wantons as before. But does not that levity 






LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 233 

imprint a still deeper melancholy on those who do 
think? Have any of our calamities corrected us? 
Are we not revelling on the brink of the precipice ? 
Does administration grow more sage, or desire that 
we should grow more sober? Are these themes for 
letters, my dear Lord? Can one repeat common 
news with indifference, while our shame is writing 
for future history by the pens of all our numerous 
enemies? (When did England see two whole armies 
lay down their arms and surrender themselves 
prisoners? Can venal addresses efface such stigmas, 
that will be recorded in every country in Europe ? 
Or will such disgraces have no consequences? Is 
not America lost to us? Shall we offer up more 
human victims to the demon of obstinacy; and 
shall we tax ourselves deeper to furnish out the 
sacrifice? These are thoughts I cannot stifle at the 
moment that enforces them ; and though I do not 
doubt but the same spirit of dissipation that has 
swallowed up all our principles will reign again in 
three days with its wonted sovereignty, I had rather 
be silent than vent my indignation. Yet I cannot 
talk, for I cannot think, on any other subject. It 
was not six days ago that, in the height of four 
raging wars, I saw in the papers an account of the 
opera and of the dresses of the company; and 
thence the town, and thence of course the whole 
nation, were informed that Mr. Fitzpatrick had 
very little powder in his hair. 

Would not one think that our newspapers were 
penned by boys just come from school, for the in- 
formation of their sisters and cousins ? Had we had 



234 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

" Gazettes " and " Morning Posts " in those days, 
would they have been filled with such tittle-tattle 
after the battle of Agincourt, or in the more re- 
sembling weeks after the battle of Naseby? Did 
the French trifle equally even during the ridiculous 
war of the Fronde? If they were as impertinent 
then, at least they had wit in their levity. We are 
monkeys in conduct, and as clumsy as bears when 
we try to gambol. Oh, my Lord, I have no 
patience with my country, and shall leave it with- 
out regret ! Can we be proud when all Europe 
scorns us ? It was wont to envy us, sometimes to 
hate us, but never despised us before. James the 
First was contemptible, but he did not lose an 
America. His eldest grandson sold us, his younger 
lost us ; but we kept ourselves. Now we have 
run to meet the ruin — and it is coming ! 

I beg your Lordship's pardon if I have said too 
much ; but I do not believe I have. You have 
never sold yourself, and therefore have not been 
accessory to our destruction. (You must be happy 
now not to have a son, who would live to grovel 
in the dregs of England. Your Lordship has long 
been so wise as to secede from the follies of your 
countrymen. May you and Lady Strafford long 
enjoy the tranquillity that has been your option even 
in better days ; and may you amuse yourself with- 
out giving loose to such reflections as have over- 
flowed in this letter from your devoted, humble 
servant ! 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 235 
LXXVI. 

A VISIT FROM A LEARNED EDITOR OF SHAKSPEARE. 

To the Rev. William Cole. 

Berkeley Square, Jan. 27, 1782. 

For these three weeks I have had the gout in 
my left elbow and hand, and can yet but just bear 
to lay the latter on the paper while I write with 
the other. However, this is no complaint, for it is 
the shortest fit I have had these sixteen years, and 
with trifling pain ; therefore, as the fits decrease, it 
does ample honor to my bootikins, regimen, and 
method. Next to my bootikins, I ascribe much 
credit to a diet-drink of dock-roots, of which Dr. 
Turton asked me for the receipt, as the best he 
had ever seen, and which I will send you if you 
please. It came from an old physician at Rich- 
mond, who did amazing service with it in inveterate 
scurvies, — the parents, or ancestors at least, I be- 
lieve, of all gouts. Your fit, I hope, is quite gone. 

Mr. Gough has been with me. I never saw a 
more dry or more cold gentleman. He told me 
his new plan is a series of English monuments. I 
do like the idea, and offered to lend him drawings 
for it. 

I have seen Mr. Steevens too, who is much more 
flowing. I wish you had told me it was the editor 
of Shakspeare, for on his mentioning Dr. Farmer, 
I launched out and said he was by much the most 
rational of Shakspeare's commentators, and had 



236 LETTERS OF HORACE W A LP OLE. 

given the only sensible account of the authors our 
great poet had consulted. I really meant those 
who wrote before Dr. Farmer. Mr. Steevens 
seemed a little surprised, which made me dis- 
cover the blunder I had made, for which I was 
very sorry, though I had meant nothing by it; 
however, do not mention it. I hope he has too 
much sense to take it ill, as he must have seen I 
had no intention of offending him ; on the contrary, 
that my whole behavior marked a desire of being 
civil to him as your friend, in which light only you 
had named him to me. Pray take no notice of it, 
though I could not help mentioning it, as it lies on 
my conscience to have been even undesignedly 
and indirectly unpolite to anybody you recom- 
mend. I should not, I trust, have been so unin- 
tentionally to anybody, nor with intention, unless 
provoked to it by great folly or dirtiness. Adieu ! 



LXXVII. 

RENEWED MOTION FOR AN ADDRESS OF PACIFICATION 
WITH AMERICA. 

To Sir Horace Mann. 

Berkeley Square, March 1, 1782. 
You know I deem myself a bad political prophet. 
I certainly did not expect that the Opposition (no 
longer the minority) would have such rapid success 
as to have gained a complete victory already. I 
wrote to you on Tuesday that on the Friday pre- 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 237 

ceding they had been beaten but by one. On 
Wednesday last, General Conway renewed his mo- 
tion for an address of pacification with America, 
and carried the question by a majority of nineteen. 
His speech was full of wit, spirit, and severity ; and 
after the debate Mr. Fox complimented him pub- 
licly on this second triumph, he also having been 
the mover of the repeal of the Stamp Act. In 
short, he stands in the highest light, and all his fame 
is unsullied by the slightest suspicion of interested 
or factious motives in his conduct. 

It would be idle in me, who profess want of pen- 
etration or intuition into futurity, to tell you what I 
think will happen ; in truth, I could not tell you, if I 
would, what I foresee. The public certainly expects 
some sudden change. I neither do, nor wish it. 
At present I think alteration would produce con- 
fusion, without any advantage. My reasons it would 
be useless to detail, for they will have no share in 
the decision. 

I would write these few words, lest your nephew 
should not, though in reality I have told you noth- 
ing. You will just be prepared not to be surprised, 
whatever shall arrive, as it is a moment which may 
produce anything. I mean a change, a partial set- 
tlement, a total one, or a re-settlement of the pres- 
ent system ; though I should think that, or a partial 
change, the least likely to last. Any one of them 
will be fortunate if productive of peace ; and at 
least nothing that has happened removes that pros- 
pect to a greater distance. If I live to see that 
moment, I shall be happier than I have for some 



238 LETTERS OF HORACE W A LP OLE. 

time expected to be. I dare not entertain greater 
views for my country, for a long season ; though 
nations, like individuals, are not precluded from 
experiencing any change of fortune. 

P. S. — When you do not hear from me at such 
a crisis, be sure that nothing material has happened. 
We have both seen interministeriums of six weeks. 



LXXVIII. 

ON A PERFORMANCE OF SOUTHERN'S " THE FATAL 
MARRIAGE," WITH MRS. SIDDONS AS ISABELLA. 

To the Countess of Ossory. 

Strawberry Hill, A r ov. 3, 1782. 
Our mutual silence, madam, has had pretty nearly 
the same cause, — want of matter ; for though my 
nominal wife, Lady Browne, has not left me, like 
your Lord, I have led almost as uneventful a life as 
your Ladyship in your lonely woods, except that I 
have been for two days in town and seen Mrs. Sid- 
dons. She pleased me beyond my expectation, but 
not up to the admiration of the ton, two or three of 
whom were in the same box with me, — particularly 
Mr. Boothby, who, as if to disclaim the stoic apathy 
of Mr. Meadows in " Cecilia," was all bravissimo. 
Mr. Crawfurd, too, asked me if I did not think her 
the best actress I ever saw? I said, " By no means ; 
we old folks were apt to be prejudiced in favor of 
our first impressions." She is a good figure, hand- 
some enough, though neither nose nor chin accord- 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 239 

ing to the Greek standard, beyond which both 
advance a good deal. Her hair is either red or she 
has no objection to its being thought so, and had 
used red powder. Her voice is clear and good ; 
but I thought she did not vary its modulations 
enough, nor ever approach enough to the familiar, — 
but this may come when more habituated to the awe 
of the audience of the capital. Her action is 
proper, but with little variety ; when without motion 
her arms are not genteel. Thus you see, madam, 
all my objections are very trifling. But what I really 
wanted, but did not find, was originality, which an- 
nounces genius, and without both which I am never 
intrinsically pleased. All Mrs. Siddons did, good 
sense or good instruction might give. I dare to 
say that were I one and twenty, I should have 
thought her marvellous ; but alas ! I remember 
Mrs. Porter and the Dumesnil, and remember every 
accent of the former in the very same part. Yet 
this is not entirely prejudice. Don't I equally recol- 
lect the whole progress of Lord Chatham and 
Charles Townshend, and does it hinder my thinking 
Mr. Fox a prodigy? Pray don't send him this 
paragraph too. 

I am not laying a courtly trap, nor at sixty-five 
projecting, like the old Duke of Newcastle, to be 
in favor in the next reign. My real meditations 
are on objects much more proper to my age. A 
letter I have just received from Lord Buchan in- 
forms me of, probably, much more splendid courts 
than the little tottering, ruined palace in St. James's 
Street. Somebody at Bath (whose name I cannot 



240 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

read !) has made a telescope that magnifies a celes- 
tial object 6450 times; by which he finds that the 
new planet (which I did not see in town, like Mrs. 
Siddons) is 160 times bigger than our little foot- 
ball; and as the inventor expects to improve his 
instrument much farther, I suppose the new planet 
will improve in proportion. Perhaps I do not talk 
like an optician or an astronomer; but think, 
madam, what exquisite glasses the new planetarians 
must have before they can have any idea of our 
existing at all ! Well, but as those 160 times big- 
ger folks may have remained in as profound igno- 
rance as Sir Joseph Banks's friends or Captain 
Cook's, how clever is it in us invisible pismires to 
have invented telescopes and calculated their size ! 
I have often asked myself whither the myriads that 
are continually swept from our earth are to be trans- 
ported. Now, as human pride concludes that the 
universal system was made for little us, here is a re- 
ceptacle large enough, — at least, that planet may 
know of others within reach, and not above some 
millions of millions of miles off. Now stoop, madam, 
as many millions of miles as all these distances 
make, and let us talk of Gibraltar. Oh, what an 
atom ! how can one figure it little enough, com- 
pared with what we have been talking of? Common- 
sense is lost in the immensity ; I am forced to look 
at my window, and persuade myself that Richmond 
Hill is a large object, before I can dismount from 
the stirrups of the telescope and talk the usual lan- 
guage of the world. 

I am glad to hear so good an account of Hatfield 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 241 

from our Lord. I have been invited thither, but I 
have done with terrestrial journeys. I have not 
philosophy enough to stand stranger servants star- 
ing at my broken fingers at dinner. I hide myself 
like spaniels that creep into a hedge to die ; yet, 
having preserved my eyes and all my teeth, among 
which is a colt's not yet decayed, I treated it and 
my eyes, not only with Mrs. Siddons, but a harle- 
quin farce. But there again my ancient prejudices 
operated : how unlike the pantomimes of Rich, 
which were full of wit and coherent, and carried on 
a story ! What I now saw was Robinson Crusoe : 
how Aristotle and Bossu, had they ever written on 
pantomimes, would swear ! It was a heap of con- 
tradictions and violations of the costume. Friday 
is turned into Harlequin, and falls down at an old 
man's feet that I took for Pantaloon, but they told 
me it was Friday's father. I said : " Then it must 
be Thursday ; " yet still it seemed to be Pantaloon. 
I see I understand nothing, from astronomy to a 
harlequin farce ! 



LXXIX. 

ON THE RECEIPT OF POWNALL'S "CHARACTER OF 
SIR ROBERT WALPOLE." 

To Governor Pownall. 

Strawberry Hill, Oct. 27, 1783. 
I am extremely obliged to you, sir, for the valu- 
able communication made to me. It is extremely 
16 



242 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

so to me, as it does justice to a memory I revere 
to the highest degree ; and I flatter myself that it 
would be acceptable to that part of the world that 
loves truth, — and that part will be the majority as 
fast as they pass away who have an interest in pre- 
ferring falsehood. Happily, truth is longer-lived 
than the passions of individuals ; and when man- 
kind are not misled, they can distinguish white 
from black. I myself do not pretend to be unpre- 
judiced ; I must be so to the best of fathers : I 
should be ashamed to be quite impartial. No 
wonder, then, sir, if I am greatly pleased with so 
able a justification; yet I am not so blinded but 
that I can discern solid reasons for admiring your 
defence. You have placed that defence on sound 
and new grounds ; and though very briefly, have 
very learnedly stated and distinguished the land- 
marks of our Constitution, and the encroachments 
made on it, by justly referring the principles of 
liberty to the Saxon system, and by imputing the 
corruptions of it to the Norman. This was a great 
deal too deep for that superficial mountebank, Hume, 
to go ; for a mountebank he was. He mounted a 
system in the garb of a philosophic empiric, but dis- 
pensed no drugs but what he was authorized to 
vend by a royal patent, and which were full of 
Turkish opium. He had studied nothing relative 
to the English Constitution before Queen Elizabeth, 
and had selected her most arbitrary acts to counte- 
nance those of the Stuarts, — and even hers he mis- 
represented \ for her worst deeds were levelled 
against the nobility, those of the Stuarts against 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 243 

the people. Hers, consequently, were rather an 
obligation to the people ; for the most heinous part 
of despotism is, that it produces a thousand despots 
instead of one. Muley Moloch cannot lop off many 
heads with his own hands, — at least, he takes those 
in his way, those of his courtiers ; but his bashaws 
and viceroys spread destruction everywhere. The 
flimsy, ignorant, blundering manner in which Hume 
executed the reigns preceding Henry VII. is a 
proof how little he had examined the history of our 
Constitution. 

I could say much, much more, sir, in commen- 
dation of your work, were I not apprehensive of 
being biassed by the subject. Still, that it would 
not be from flattery, I will prove, by taking the 
liberty of making two objections ; and they are 
only to the last page but one. Perhaps you will 
think that my first objection does show that I am 
too much biassed. I own I am sorry to see my 
father compared to Sylla. The latter was a sangui- 
nary usurper, a monster ; the former the mildest, 
most forgiving, best-natured of men, and a legal 
minister. Nor, I fear, will the only light in which 
you compare them stand the test. Sylla resigned 
his power voluntarily, insolently, perhaps timidly, 
as he might think he had a better chance of dying 
in his bed if he retreated, than by continuing to 
rule by force. My father did not retire by his own 
option. He had lost the majority of the House of 
Commons. Sylla, you say, sir, retired unimpeached ; 
it is true, but covered with blood. My father was not 
impeached in our strict sense of the word • but, to 



244 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

my great joy, he was in effect. A secret committee 

— a worse inquisition than a jury — was named, not 
to try him, but to sift his life for crimes ; and out of 
such a jury, chosen in the dark, and not one of 
whom he might challenge, he had some determined 
enemies, many opponents, and but two he could 
suppose his friends. And what was the conse- 
quence? A man charged with every State crime 
almost for twenty years was proved to have done 

— what? Paid some writers much more than they 
deserved for having defended him against ten thou- 
sand and ten thousand libels (some of which had 
been written by his inquisitors), all which libels were 
confessed to have been lies by his inquisitors them- 
selves, for they could not produce a shadow of one 
of the crimes with which they have charged him ! 
I must own, sir, I think that Sylla and my father ought 
to be set in opposition rather than paralleled. 

My other objection is still more serious ; and if 
I am so happy as to convince you, I shall hope that 
you will alter the paragraph, — as it seems to impute 
something to Sir Robert of which he was not only 
most innocent, but of which if he had been guilty 
I should think him extremely so, for he would have 
been very ungrateful. You say he had not the 
comfort to see that he had established his own 
family by anything which he received from the 
gratitude of that Hanover family, or from the grati- 
tude of that country which he had saved and 
served. Good sir, what does this sentence seem 
to imply, but that either Sir Robert himself or his 
family thought or think that the Kings George I. 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 245 

and II., or England, were ungrateful in not reward- 
ing his services? Defend him and us from such a 
charge ! He nor we ever had such a thought. Was 
it not rewarding him to make him Prime Minister 
and maintain and support him against his enemies 
for twenty years together? Did not George I. make 
his eldest son a peer, and give to the father and son 
a valuable patent place in the Custom House, for 
three lives? Did not George II. give my elder 
brother the Auditor's place, and to my brother and 
me other rich places for our lives, — for though in 
the gift of the First Lord of the Treasury, do we not 
owe them to the King who made him so ? Did not 
the late King make my father an earl and dismiss 
him with a pension of ^4000 a year for his life? 
Could he or we not think these ample rewards? 
What rapacious, sordid wretches must he and we 
have been, and be, could we entertain such an idea ! 
As far have we all been from thinking him neg- 
lected by his country. Did not his country see and 
know, these rewards? And could it think these 
rewards inadequate? Besides, sir, great as I hold 
my father's services, they were solid and silent, not 
ostensible. They were of a kind to which I hold 
your justification a more suitable reward than pe- 
cuniary recompenses. To have fixed the House of 
Hanover on the throne, to have maintained this 
country in peace and affluence for twenty years, 
with the other services you record, sir, were actions 
the eclat of which must be illustrated by time and 
reflection, and whose splendor has been brought 
forwarder than I wish it had by comparison with 



246 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

a period very dissimiliar ! If Sir Robert had not 
the comfort of leaving his family in affluence, it 
was not imputable to his King or his country. Per- 
haps I am proud that he did not. He died forty 
thousand pounds in debt. 1 That was the wealth of 
a man that had been taxed as the plunderer of his 
country ! Yet, with all my adoration of my father, 
I am just enough to own that it was his own fault 
he died so poor. He had made Houghton much 
too magnificent for the moderate estate which he 
left to support it; and as he never — I repeat it 
with truth, never — got any money but in the South 
Sea and while he was paymaster, his fondness for 
his paternal seat and his boundless generosity were 
too expensive for his fortune. I will mention one 
instance which will show how little he was disposed 
to turn the favor of the Crown to his own profit. 
He laid out fourteen thousand pounds of his own 
money on Richmond New Park. I could produce 
other reasons too why Sir Robert's family were not 
in so comfortable a situation as the world, deluded 
by misrepresentation, might expect to see them at 
his death. My eldest brother had been a very bad 
economist during his father's life, and died himself 
fifty thousand pounds in debt, or more ; so that to 
this day neither Sir Edward nor I have received the 
five thousand pounds apiece which Sir Robert left 
us as our fortunes. I do not love to charge the 
dead, therefore will only say that Lady Orford 
(reckoned a vast fortune, which till she died she 

1 The very sum that Sir Robert gave for his collection 
of pictures. 



LETTERS OF HORACE W A LP OLE. 247 

never proved) wasted vast sums ; nor did my 
brother or father ever receive but the twenty thou- 
sand pounds which she brought at first, and which 
were spent on the wedding and christening, — I 
mean, including her jewels. 

I beg pardon, sir, for this tedious detail, which 
is minutely, perhaps too minutely, true ; but when 
I took the liberty of contesting any part of a work 
which I admire so much, I owed it to you and to 
myself to assign my reasons. I trust they will 
satisfy you ; and if they do, I am sure you will alter 
a paragraph against which it is the duty of the family 
to exclaim. Dear as my father's memory is to my 
soul, I can never subscribe to the position that he 
was unrewarded by the House of Hanover. 



LXXX. 

ON THE "GOOD THINGS" OF LIFE. 
To the Hon. H. S. Conway. 

Strawberry Hill,/hm 25, 1784. 
I can answer you very readily in your own tone, 
that is, about weather and country grievances, and 
without one word of news or politics ; for I know 
neither, nor inquire of them. I am very well con- 
tent to be a Struldbrug, and to exist after I have 
done being: and I am still better pleased that you 
are in the same way of thinking, or of not thinking ; 
for I am sure both your health and your mind will 



248 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

find the benefits of living for yourself and family 
only. It were not fit that the young should con- 
centre themselves in so narrow a circle ; nor do 
the young seem to have any such intention. (Let 
them mend or mar the world as they please, the 
world takes its own way upon the whole ; and 
though there may be an uncommon swarm of 
animalculae for a season, things return into their 
own channel from their own bias before any effec- 
tual nostrum of fumigation is discovered. In the 
mean time, I am for giving all due weight to local 
grievances, though with no natural turn towards at- 
tending to them ; but they serve for conversation. 
We have no newly invented grubs to eat our fruit, 
— indeed, I have no fruit to be eaten ; but I should 
not lament if the worms would eat my gardener, who, 
you know, is so bad an one that I never have 
anything in my garden. 

I am now waiting for dry weather to cut my hay ; 
though Nature certainly never intended hay should 
be cut dry, as it always rains all June. But here is 
a worse calamity : one is never safe by day or night ; 
Mrs. Walsingham, who has bought your brother's 
late house at Ditton, was robbed a few days ago 
in the high road, within a mile of home, at seven 
in the evening. The dii minorum gentium pilfer 
everything. Last night they stole a couple of yards 
of lead off the pediment of the door of my cottage. 
A gentleman at Putney, who has three men-servants, 
had his house broken open last week, and lost some 
fine miniatures, which he valued so much that he 
would not hang them up. You may imagine what 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 249 

a pain this gives me in my baubles ! I have been 
making the round of my fortifications this morning, 
and ordering new works. 

I am concerned for the account you give me of 
your brother. Life does not appear to be such 
a jewel as to preserve it carefully for its own sake. 
I think the same of its good things : if they do not 
procure amusement or comfort, I doubt they only 
produce the contrary. Yet it is silly to repine, for 
probably, whatever any man does by choice, he 
knows will please him best, or at least will prevent 
greater uneasiness. I therefore rather retract my 
concern ; for with a vast fortune, Lord Hertford 
might certainly do what he would : and if, at his 
age, he can wish for more than that fortune will 
obtain, I may pity his taste or temper, but I shall 
think that you and I are much happier who can find 
enjoyments in an humbler sphere, nor envy those 
who have no time for trifling. I, who have never 
done anything else, am not at all weary of my oc- 
cupation. Even three days of continued rain have 
not put me out of humor or spirits. Cest beaucoup 
dire for an Anglais. Adieu ! 



250 LETTERS OF HORACE W A LP OLE. 
LXXXI. 

STRAWBERRY HILL LANDSCAPES. 
To Sir Horace Mann. 

Strawberry Hill, Sept. 30, 1784. 

I shall now be expecting your nephew soon, and 
I trust with a perfectly good account of you. The 
next time he visits you I may be able to send you a 
description of my Galleria, — I have long been pre- 
paring it, and it is almost finished, — with some 
prints, which, however, I doubt, will convey no very 
adequate idea of it. In the first place, they are but 
moderately executed ; I could not afford to pay our 
principal engravers, whose prices are equal to, nay, 
far above, those of former capital painters. In the 
next, as there is a solemnity in the house, of which 
the cuts will give you an idea, they cannot add the 
gay variety of the scene without, which is very dif- 
ferent from every side, and almost from every 
chamber, and makes a most agreeable contrast ; the 
house being placed almost in an elbow of the 
Thames, which surrounds half, and consequently 
beautifies three of the aspects. Then my little hill 
— and diminutive enough it is — gazes up to Royal 
Richmond ; and Twickenham on the left, and 
Kingston Wick on the right, are seen across bends 
of the river, which on each hand appears like a 
Lilliputian seaport. Swans, cows, sheep, coaches, 
post-chaises, carts, horsemen, and foot-passengers 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 251 

are continually in view. The fourth scene is a large 
common-field, a constant prospect of harvest and 
its stages, traversed under my windows by the great 
road to Hampton Court, — in short, an animated 
view of the country. These moving pictures com- 
pensate the conventual gloom of the inside, which, 
however, when the sun shines, is gorgeous, as he ap- 
pears all crimson and gold and azure through the 
painted glass. Now, to be quite fair, you must 
turn the perspective, and look at this vision through 
the diminishing end of the telescope ; for nothing is 
so small as the whole, and even Mount Richmond 
would not reach up to Fiesole's shoe-buckle. If 
your nephew is still with you, he will confirm the 
truth of all the pomp, and all the humility, of my de- 
scription. I grieve that you would never come and 
cast an eye on it ! But are even our visions pure 
from alloy? Does not some drawback always hang 
over them? and, being visions, how rapidly must 
not they fleet away ! Yes, yes ; our smiles and our 
tears are almost as transient as the lustre of the 
morning and the shadows of the evening, and 
almost as frequently interchanged. Our passions 
form airy balloons, we know not how to direct 
them ; and the very inflammable matter that 
transports them often makes the bubble burst. 
Adieu ! 



252 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 
LXXXII 

ON THE PUBLICATION OF PRIVATE LETTERS. 

To Dr. Joseph Warton. 

Berkeley Square, Dec. 9, 1784. 

I am very much obliged to you, sir, for your 
repeated kindness and communications, and was 
much pleased at the sight of both the letters of 
Voltaire and Mr. Windham, which I return with 
thanks and gratitude. Both are curious in different 
ways. Voltaire's English would be good English in 
any other foreigner ; but a man who gave himself 
the air of criticising our — and, I will say, the 
world's — greatest author, ought to have been a 
better master of our language, though this letter 
and his commentary prove that he could neither 
write it nor read it accurately and intelligently. 

That little triumph, however, I shall decline, — I 
mean, I will make no use of his letter. It would be 
a still poorer scrap than it is, if curtailed; and I 
would by no means be accessory to printing the 
first part, in which I am happy to find you agree 
with me. Indeed, it would be publishing scandal, 
and to the vexation of an innocent gentleman. I 
condemn exceedingly all publication of private 
letters in which living persons are named. I thought 
it scandalous to print Lord Chesterfield's and Presi- 
dent Montesquieu's letters. It is cruel to the 
writers, cruel to the persons named, and is a prac- 
tice that would destroy private intercourse in a 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 253 

great measure. What father could venture to warn 
his son against the company of such or such a 
person if it were likely that a Curll or a Mrs. Stan- 
hope would print his letter with the names at 
length ! I detained my own fourth volume of 
" Painters " for nine years, though there is certainly 
no abuse in it, lest it should not satisfy the children 
of some of those artists. 

Still I am far, sir, from carrying this delicacy so 
far as some expect. I would respect the characters 
of the living and the feelings of their children. I 
should not have so much management for their 
grandchildren, who may have a full portion of pride 
about their ancestry, but certainly have very rarely 
a grain of affectionate tenderness for them. I did 
give much offence to some persons who yearned 
with those genealogic duties, by my " Catalogue of 
Royal and Noble Authors ; " but I did not care a 
straw. Indeed, if every bad man who has had 
the honor of being great-grandfather to some one 
or other, was to be spared for fear of shocking his 
noble descendants, history would be as fulsome as 
dedications were some years ago. Philip II. was 
ancestor to half the monarchs of Europe : may not 
he be branded as a monster without offence to their 
Majesties? 



254 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 
LXXXIII. 

CRITICISM ON POETRY. — MADAME DE SE"VIGNE*. 

To John Pinkerton, Esq. 

June 26, 1785. 

I have sent your book to Mr. Colman, sir, and 
must desire you in return to offer my grateful thanks 
to Mr. Knight, who has done me an honor, to which 
I do not know how I am entitled, by the present of 
his poetry, which is very classic and beautiful and 
tender, and of chaste simplicity. 

To your book, sir, I am much obliged on many 
accounts, particularly for having recalled my mind 
to subjects of delight, to which it was grown dulled 
by age and indolence. In consequence of your 
reclaiming it, I asked myself whence you feel so 
much disregard for certain authors whose fame is 
established ; you have assigned good reasons for 
withholding your approbation from some, on the 
plea of their being imitators : it was natural, then, 
to ask myself again whence they had obtained so 
much celebrity. I think I have discovered a cause 
which I do not remember to have seen noted ; and 
that cause I suspect to have been, that certain of 
those authors possessed grace. Do not take me 
for a disciple of Lord Chesterfield, nor imagine that 
I mean to erect grace into a capital ingredient of 
writing ; but I do believe that it is a perfume that 
will preserve from putrefaction, and is distinct even 
from style, which regards expression. Grace, I think, 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 255 

belongs to manner. It is from the charm of grace 
that I believe some authors, not in your favor, ob- 
tained part of their renown, — Virgil, in particular ; 
and yet I am far from disagreeing with you on his 
subject in general. There is such a dearth of in- 
vention in the ^Eneid (and when he did invent, it 
was often so foolishly), so little good sense, so little 
variety, and so little power over the passions that 
I have frequently said, from contempt for his matter, 
and from the charm of his harmony, that I believe 
I should like his poem better if I was to hear it 
repeated and did not understand Latin. On the 
other hand, he has more than harmony : whatever 
he utters is said gracefully, and he ennobles his 
images, especially in the Georgics, — or at least it is 
more sensible there, from the humility of the sub- 
ject. A Roman farmer might not understand his 
diction in agriculture, but he made a Roman 
courtier understand farming, the farming of that 
age, and could captivate a lord of Augustus's bed- 
chamber, and tempt him to listen to themes of 
rusticity. On the contrary, Statius and Claudian, 
though talking of war, would make a soldier despise 
them as bullies. That graceful manner of thinking 
in Virgil seems to me to be more than style, if I do 
not refine too much. A style may be excellent 
without grace ; for instance, Dr. Swift's. Eloquence 
may bestow an immortal style, and one of more 
dignity ; yet eloquence may want that ease, that 
genteel air that flows from or constitutes grace. 
Addison himself was master of that grace, even in 
his pieces of humor, and which do not owe their 



256 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

merit to style ; and from that combined secret he 
excels all men that ever lived, but Shakspeare, in 
humor, by never dropping into an approach towards 
burlesque and buffoonery, when even his humor 
descended to characters that in other hands would 
have been vulgarly low. Is not it clear that Will 
Wimble was a gentleman, though he always lived at 
a distance from good company? Fielding had as 
much humor, perhaps, as Addison, but having no 
idea of grace, is perpetually disgusting. His inn- 
keepers and parsons are the grossest of their pro- 
fession, and his gentlemen are awkward when they 
should be at their ease. 

The Grecians had grace in everything, — in poetry, 
in oratory, in statuary, in architecture, and probably 
in music and painting. The Romans, it is true, 
were their imitators; but having grace too, im- 
parted it to their copies, which gave them a merit 
that almost raises them to the rank of originals. 
Horace's Odes acquired their fame, no doubt, 
from the graces of his manner and purity of his 
style, — the chief praise of Tibullus and Propertius, 
who certainly cannot boast of more meaning than 
Horace's Odes. 

Waller, whom you proscribe, sir, owed his repu- 
tation to the graces of his manner, though he 
frequently stumbled- and even fell flat ; but a few 
of his smaller pieces are as graceful as possible, — 
one might say that he excelled in painting ladies in 
enamel, but could not succeed in portraits in oil, 
large as life. Milton had such superior merit that 
I will only say that if his angels, his Satan, and his 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 257 

Adam have as much dignity as the Apollo Belvi- 
dere, his Eve has all the delicacy and graces of the 
Venus of Medicis ; as his description of Eden has 
the coloring of Albano. Milton's tenderness im- 
prints ideas as graceful as Guido's Madonnas ; and 
the "Allegro," " Penseroso," and " Comus " might 
be denominated from the three Graces, — as the 
Italians gave similar titles to two or three of 
Petrarch's best sonnets. 

Cowley, I think, would have had grace (for his 
mind was graceful) if he had had any ear, or if his 
taste had not been vitiated by the pursuit of wit, — 
which when it does not offer itself naturally, de- 
generates into tinsel or pertness. Pertness is the 
mistaken affectation of grace, as pedantry produces 
erroneous dignity : the familiarity of the one, and 
the clumsiness of the other, distort or prevent grace. 
Nature, that furnishes samples of all qualities, and 
on the scale of gradation exhibits all possible shades, 
affords us types that are more apposite than words. 
The eagle is sublime, the lion majestic, the swan 
graceful, the monkey pert, the bear ridiculously 
awkward. I mention these as more expressive and 
comprehensive than I could make definitions of my 
meaning ; but I will apply the swan only, under 
whose wings I will shelter an apology for Racine, 
whose pieces gives me an idea of that bird. The 
coloring of the swan is pure ; his attitudes are 
graceful • he never displeases you when sailing on 
his proper element. His feet may be ugly, his 
notes hissing, not musical, his walk not natural ; he 
can soar, but it is with difficulty, — still, the im- 
17 



258 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

pression the swan leaves is that of grace. So does 
Racine. 

Boileau may be compared to the dog, whose 
sagacity is remarkable, as well as its fawning on its 
master and its snarling at those it dislikes. If 
Boileau was too austere to admit the pliability of 
grace, he compensates by good sense and propriety. 
He is like (for I will drop animals) an upright 
magistrate whom you respect, but whose justice 
and severity leave an awe that discourages famil- 
iarity. His copies of the ancients may be too 
servile ; but if a good translator deserves praise, 
Boileau deserves more. He certainly does not fall 
below his originals ; and considering at what period 
he wrote, has greater merit still. By his imitations 
he held out to his countrymen models of taste, and 
banished totally the bad taste of his predecessors. 
For his " Lutrin," replete with excellent poetry, wit, 
humor, and satire, he certainly was not obliged to 
the ancients. Excepting Horace, how little idea 
had either Greeks or Romans of wit and humor ! 
Aristophanes and Lucian, compared with moderns, 
were, the one a blackguard, and the other a buffoon. 
In my eyes, the " Lutrin," the " Dispensary," and 
the " Rape of the Lock " are standards of grace 
and elegance not to be paralleled by antiquity ; 
and eternal reproaches to Voltaire, whose indelicacy 
in the " Pucelle " degraded him as much, when 
compared with the three authors I have named, as 
his " Henriade " leaves Virgil, and even Lucan, 
whom he more resembles, by far his superiors. 

The " Dunciad " is blemished by the offensive 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 259 

images of the games ; but the poetry appears to 
me admirable ; and though the fourth book has 
obscurities, I prefer it to the three others : it has 
descriptions not surpassed by any poet that ever 
existed, and which surely a writer merely ingenious 
will never equal. The lines on Italy, on Venice, 
or Convents, have all the grace for which I contend 
as distinct from poetry, though united with the 
most beautiful; and the "Rape of the Lock," 
besides the originality of great part of the invention, 
is a standard of graceful writing. 

In general, I believe that what I call "grace " is 
denominated " elegance ; " but by grace I mean 
something higher. I will explain myself by instances : 
Apollo is graceful, Mercury is elegant. Petrarch, 
perhaps, owed his whole merit to the harmony of 
his numbers and the graces of his style. They 
conceal his poverty of meaning and want of variety. 
His complaints, too, may have added an interest, 
which, had his passion been successful, and had 
expressed itself with equal sameness, would have 
made the number of his sonnets insupportable. 
Melancholy in poetry, I am inclined to think, con- 
tributes to grace, when it is not disgraced by pitiful 
lamentations, such as Ovid's and Cicero's in their 
banishments. We respect melancholy, because it 
imparts a similar affection, pity. A gay writer, who 
should only express satisfaction without variety, 
would soon be nauseous. 

Madame de Sevigne" shines both in grief and 
gayety. There is too much of sorrow for her daugh- 
ter's absence ; yet it is always expressed by new 



260 LETTERS OF HORACE W ALP OLE. 

terms, by new images, and often by wit, whose 
tenderness has a melancholy air. When she forgets 
her concern, and returns to her natural disposition, 
— gayety, — every paragraph has novelty ; her allu- 
sions, her applications, are the happiest possible. 
She has the art of making you acquainted with all 
her acquaintance, and attaches you even to the spots 
she inhabited. Her language is correct, though 
unstudied ; and when her mind is full of any great 
event, she interests you with the warmth of a dra- 
matic writer, not with the chilling impartiality of an 
historian. Pray read her accounts of the death of 
Turenne, and of the arrival of King James in France, 
and tell me whether you do not know their persons 
as if you had lived at the time. 

For my part, if you will allow me a word of di- 
gression (not that I have written with any method) , 
I hate the cold impartiality recommended to his- 
torians : " Si vis me flere, dolendum est primum 
ipsi tibi ; " but that I may not wander again, nor 
tire, nor contradict you any more, I will finish now, 
and shall be glad if you will dine at Strawberry Hill 
next Sunday, and take a bed there, when I will tell 
you how many more parts of your book have pleased 
me than have startled my opinions, or, perhaps, 
prejudices. I have the honor to be, sir, with re- 
gard, etc. 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 261 



LXXXIV. 

ON THE RECEIPT OF " FLORIO," DEDICATED TO 
HIMSELF. 

To Miss Hannah More. 

Berkeley Square, Feb. 9, 1786. 
It is very cruel, my dear madam, when you send 
me such charming lines, and say such kind and Mat- 
tering things to me and of me, that I cannot even 
thank you with my own poor hand; and yet my 
hand is as much obliged to you as my eye and ear 
and understanding. My hand was in great pain 
when your present arrived. I opened it directly, 
and set to reading, till your music and my own van- 
ity composed a quieting draught that glided to the 
ends of my fingers, and lulled the throbs into the 
deliquium that attends opium when it does not put 
one absolutely to sleep. I don't believe that the 
deity who formerly practised both poetry and phy- 
sic, when gods got their livelihood by more than one 
profession, ever gave a recipe in rhyme ; and there- 
fore, since Dr. Johnson has prohibited application 
to pagan divinities, and Mr. Burke has not struck 
medicine and poetry out of the list of sinecures, I 
wish you may get a patent for life for exercising both 
faculties. It would be a comfortable event for me ; 
for since I cannot wait on you to thank you, nor 
dare ask you 

" To call your doves yourself" 
and visit me in your Parnassian quality, I might 



262 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

send for you as my physicianess. Yet why should not 
I ask you to come and see me? You are not such 
a prude as to 

" Blush to show compassion," 
though it should 

" Not chance this year to be the fashion." 1 

And I can tell you that powerful as your poetry is, 
and old as I am, I believe a visit from you would 
do me as much good almost as your verses. In the 
mean time, I beg you to accept of an addition to 
your Strawberry editions; and believe me to be, 
with the greatest gratitude, your too-much honored 
and most obliged, humble servant. 



LXXXV. 

ACKNOWLEDGING THE RECEIPT OF A CAMEO. 

To Sir Horace Mann. 

June 22, 1786. 
I have not yet received your letter by Mrs. 
Darner, my dear sir, but I have that of June 3d, 
which announces it. I lament the trouble your 
cough gives you, though I am quite persuaded that 
it is medicinal, and diverts the gout from critical 
parts. I have felt so much, and consequently have 
observed so much, of chronical disorders that I 
don't think I deceive myself. Should you tell me 
your complaint is not gouty, I should reply that all 

1 See Florio. 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 263 

chronical distempers are or ought to be gout ; and 
when they do not appear in their proper form, are 
only deviations. Coughs in old persons clear the 
lungs ; and, as I have told you, I know two elderly 
persons who are never so well as when they have a 
cough. 

I love Mrs. Darner for her attention to you, but 
I shall scold her, instead of you, for letting you send 
me the cameo. To you I will not say a cross word, 
when you are weak ; but why will you not let me 
love you without being obliged to it by gratitude ? 
You make me appear in my own eyes interested, — 
a dirty quality, of which I flattered myself I was to- 
tally free. Gratitude may be a virtue ; but what is a 
man who consents to have fifty obligations to be so 
virtuous ? I have always professed hating presents ; 
must not I appear a hypocrite when I have accepted 
so many from you? Well ! as I have registered 
them all in the printed catalogue of my collection, 
I hope I shall be called a mercenary wretch ; I 
deserve it. 

Nothing you tell me of the Episcopal Court sur- 
prises me, — he is horrible ! His nephew Fitzgerald, 
whom his Holiness, though knowing his infernal 
character, had destined to put into orders and pre- 
sent with a rich living, had it fallen vacant, is hanged 
for a most atrocious murder, which has brought out 
others still blacker; but the story is too shocking 
for your good-natured, feeble nerves. The great 
culprit Hastings's fate is not decided, but, to his 
and mankind's surprise, the House of Commons 
last week voted him on one of the articles deserv- 



264 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

ing to be impeached, and Mr. Pitt declared on that 
article against him ; so Burke has proved to have 
been in the right in his prosecution. 

The French prisoners have come off better than 
I expected. I said early I was sure I should never 
understand the story ; I am very sure now that I do 
not. Never did I like capital punishments : but 
when they are committed, how comes so prodigious 
a robbery to escape ? The Cardinal, supposing him 
merely a dupe, is not sufficiently punished. A prince 
may be duped by a low wretch ; a low man may be 
bubbled by a prince ; but it is not excusable in a 
man who has kept both the best and the worst 
company to be made such a tool. I would at least 
have sequestered his revenues till the jewellers were 
paid, — for I do not see why the Cardinal's family 
should suffer for his roguery or folly, — and then I 
would have deprived him of his employments, as in- 
capable. For that rascal Cagliostro, he should be 
punished for joining in the mummery, and shut up 
for his other impositions. For his legend, it is more 
preposterous, absurd, and incredible than anything 
in the Arabian Nights. He is come hither; and 
why should one think but he may be popular here 
too ! But enough of criminals and adventurers, — 
though perhaps it is not much changing the theme 
to tell you that I have received a letter from Con- 
stantinople, as I had one from Petersburg, before 
that from Venice, after the heroine 1 had left Flor- 
ence. She is now gone to the Greek Isles, and bids 

1 Lady Craven, a famous traveller, and author of "Jour- 
ney through the Crimea to England " (1789). 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 265 

me next direct to Vienna. I have answered none ; 
I had a mind to direct to the Fiancee du Roi de 
Garbe. I shall at least stay till I hear that she is 
not a prize to some corsair. 

Your nephew and niece, I hear, are married. 
The father, I hope, will now soon make you an- 
other visit; I love to have him with you. 

I talked of gratitude : but recollect that I have 
not even thanked you for your cameo. I hope this 
looks like not being delighted with it : how can I 
say such a brutal thing? I am charmed with your 
kindness, though I wished for no more proofs of it. 
In short, I don't know how to steer between my in- 
clination for expressing my full sense of your friend- 
ship, and my pride, that is not fond of being obliged 
— and so very often obliged — by those I love most. 
Oh ! but I have a much worse vice than pride 
(which, begging the clergy's pardon, I don't think a 
very heinous one, as it is a counter-poison to mean- 
ness) , — I am monstrously ungrateful ; I have re- 
ceived a thousand valuable presents from you, and 
yet never made you one ! I shall begin to think I 
am avaricious too. In short, my dear sir, your 
cameo is a mirror in which I discover a thousand 
faults of which I did not suspect myself, besides all 
those which I did know. No, no, I will not lecture 
Mrs. Damer, but myself. I absolve you, and am 
determined to think myself a prodigy of rapacity ! 
I see there is no merit in not loving money, if one 
loves playthings. I have often declaimed against 
collectors, who will do anything mean to obtain a 
rarity they want : pray is that so bad as accepting 



266 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

curiosities, and never making a return? Oh, I am 
the most ungrateful of all virtuosos, as you are the 
most generous of all friends ! Well, the worse I 
think of myself, the better I think of you, — and that 
is some compensation for the contempt I have for 
myself; and I will be content to serve as a foil to 
you. Adieu ! 

LXXXVI. 

A CHAT WITH MRS. SIDDONS. 

To the Countess of Ossory. 

Berkeley Square, Jan. 15, 1788. 

All joy to your Ladyship on the success of your 
theatric campaign ! I do think the representation 
of plays as entertaining and ingenious, as choosing 
king and queen, and the gambols and mummeries 
of our ancestors at Christmas, or as making one's 
neighbors and all their servants drunk, and send- 
ing them home ten miles in the dark, with the 
chance of breaking their necks by some comical 
overturn. I wish I could have been one of the 
audience ; but, alas ! I am like the African lamb, 
and can only feed on the grass and herbs that grow 
within my reach. 

I can make no returns yet from the theatre at 
Richmond House ; the Duke and Duchess do not 
come till the birthday, and I have been at no more 
rehearsals, being satisfied with two of the play. 
Prologue or epilogue there is to be none, as neither 
the plays nor the performers, in general, are new. 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 267 

The "Jealous Wife " is to succeed for the exhibition 
of Mrs. Hobart, who could have no part in " The 
Wonder." 

My histrionic acquaintance spreads. I supped 
at Lady Dorothy Hotham's with Mrs. Siddons, and 
have visited and been visited by her, and have seen 
and liked her much, — yes, very much, — in the pas- 
sionate scenes in " Percy ; " but I do not admire 
her in cool declamation, and find her voice very hol- 
low and defective. I asked her in which part she 
would most wish me to see her? She named Portia 
in the " Merchant of Venice ; " but I begged to be 
excused. With all my enthusiasm for Shakspeare, 
it is one of his plays that I like the least. The 
story of the caskets is silly, and except the char- 
acter of Shylock, I see nothing beyond the attain- 
ment of a mortal : Euripides or Racine or Voltaire 
might have written all the rest. Moreover, Mrs. 
Siddons's warmest devotees do not hold her above 
a demi-goddess in comedy. I have chosen " Athe- 
nais," in which she is to appear soon; her scorn is 
admirable. 

Of news I have heard none but foreign, nor those 
more circumstantially than the papers recount. 
The Russian Empress, the Austrian Emperor, and 
Mount Vesuvius are playing the devil with the 
world. The Parliaments of France, in the usual 
disproportion of good to evil, are aiming at wrench- 
ing from the Crown some freedom for their country, 
— at a fortunate and wise moment, for the Crown is 
poor, and cannot bribe even the nobility, who will 
mutiny, since they cannot sell themselves. The 



268 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

elements, too, as if their pensions also were struck 
off, have vented their wrath on some of the costly 
cones at Cherbourg. Well, we have a little breath- 
ing time, and may play the fool. 



LXXXVII. 

CONCERNING VOLTAIRE, MRS. PIOZZI, AND OTHERS. 
To Miss Ha.7inah More. 

Strawberry Hill, July 12, 1788. 

Won't you repent having opened the correspon- 
dence, my dear madam, when you find my letters 
come so thick upon you? In this instance, how- 
ever, I am only to blame in part, for being too 
ready to take advice, for the sole reason for which 
advice ever is taken, — because it fell in with my 
inclination. 

You said in your last that you feared you took up 
time of mine to the prejudice of the public, — imply- 
ing, I imagine, that I might employ it in composing. 
Waiving both your compliment and my own vanity, 
I will speak very seriously to you on that subject, 
and will exact truth. My simple writings have had 
better fortune than they had any reason to expect ; 
and I fairly believe, in a great degree, because 
gentlemen writers, who do not write for interest, 
are treated with some civility if they do not write 
absolute nonsense. I think so, because I have not 
unfrequently known much better works than mine 
much more neglected, if the name, fortune, and 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 269 

situation of the authors were below mine. I wrote 
early from youth, spirits, and vanity ; and from both 
the last when the first no longer existed. I now 
shudder when I reflect on my own boldness, and 
with mortification when I compare my own writings 
with those of any great authors. This is so true 
that I question whether it would be possible for 
me to summon up courage to publish anything I 
have written, if I could recall time past, and should 
yet think as I think at present. So much for what 
is over and out of my power. As to writing now, 
I have totally forsworn the profession, for two 
solid reasons. One I have already told you ; and 
it is, that I know my own writings are trifling and 
of no depth. The other is that, light and futile 
as they were, I am sensible they are better than I 
could compose now. I am aware of the decay of 
the middling parts I had, and others may be still 
more sensible of it. How do I know but I am 
superannuated ? Nobody will be so coarse as to tell 
me so ; but if I published dotage, all the world would 
tell me so. And who but runs that risk who is an 
author after seventy? What happened to the great- 
est author of this age, and who certainly retained a 
very considerable portion of his abilities for ten 
years after my age? Voltaire, at eighty-four, I 
think, went to Paris to receive the incense, in 
person, of his countrymen, and to be witness of 
their admiration of a tragedy he had written at 
that Methusalem age. Incense he did receive till 
it choked him ; and at the exhibition of his play 
he was actually crowned with laurel in the box 



270 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

where he sat ! But what became of his poor play ? 
It died as soon as he did, — was buried with him ; 
and no mortal, I dare to say, has ever read a line 
of it since, it was so bad. 1 

As I am neither by a thousandth part so great, 
nor a quarter so little, I will herewith send you a 
fragment that an accidental rencontre set me upon 
writing, and which I found so flat that I would not 
finish it. Don't believe that I am either begging 
praise by the stale artifice of hoping to be contra- 
dicted, or that I think there is any occasion to 
make you discover my caducity. No ; but the 
fragment contains a curiosity, — English verses 
written by a French Prince of the blood, 2 and 
which at first I had a mind to add to my " Royal 
and Noble Authors ; " but as he was not a royal 
author of ours, and as I could not please myself 
with an account of him, I shall revert to my old 
resolution of not exposing my pen's gray hairs. 

Of one passage I must take notice : it is a little 
indirect sneer at our crowd of authoresses. My 
choosing to send this to you is a proof that I think 
you an author, that is, a classic. But, in truth, I 
am nauseated by the Madams Piozzi, etc., and the 
host of novel-writers in petticoats who think they 
imitate what is inimitable, — " Evelina " and " Ce- 
cilia." Your candor, I know, will not agree with 
me when I tell you I am not at all charmed with 
Miss Seward and Mr. Hayley piping to one another ; 

1 Irene. 

2 Charles, Duke of Orleans, taken as a prisoner to Eng- 
land after the battle of Agincourt. 



LETTERS OF HORACE W A LP OLE. 271 

but you I exhort and would encourage to write, 
and flatter myself you will never be royally gagged 
and promoted to fold muslins, as has been lately 
wittily said on Miss Burney, x in the List of five 
hundred living authors. Your writings promote 
virtues ; and their increasing editions prove their 
worth and utility. If you question my sincerity, 
can you doubt my admiring you when you have 
gratified my self-love so amply in your " Bas 
Bleu"? Still, as much as I love your writings, I 
respect yet more your heart and your goodness. 
You are so good that I believe you would go to 
heaven, even though there were no Sunday, and 
only six working days in the week. Adieu, my 
best madam ! 

LXXXVIII. 

ON MEETING THE MISSES BERRY. 

To the Countess of Ossory. 

Strawberry Hill, Oct. n, 1788. 
I am sorry, madam, that mes villageoises have no 
better provender than my syllogisms to send to their 
correspondents, nor am I ambitious of rivalling the 
barber or innkeeper, and becoming the wit of five 
miles round. I remember how, long ago, I esti- 
mated local renown at its just value by a sort of 
little adventure that I will tell you ; and since that 
there is an admirable chapter somewhere in Voltaire 

1 The author of "Evelina" had been made joint keeper 
of the Queen's Robes. 



272 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

which shows that more extended fame is but local 
on a little larger scale, — it is the chapter of the 
Chinese who goes into a European bookseller's 
shop, and is amazed at finding none of the works of 
his most celebrated countrymen ; while the book- 
seller finds the stranger equally ignorant of Western 
classics. 

Well, madam, here is my tiny story. I went 
once with Mr. Rigby to see a window of painted 
glass at Messling, in Essex, and dined at a better 
sort of alehouse. The landlady waited on us and 
was notably loquacious, and entertained us with the 
bons-mots and funny exploits of Mr. Charles : Mr. 
Charles said this, Mr. Charles played such a trick ; 
oh, nothing was so pleasant as Mr. Charles ! But 
how astonished the poor soul was when we asked 
who Mr. Charles was, and how much more as- 
tonished when she found we had never heard of Mr. 
Charles Luchyn, who, it seems, is a relation of Lord 
Grimston, had lived in their village, and been the 
George Selwyn x of half a dozen cottages. 

If I had a grain of ambitious pride left, it is what 
in other respects has been the thread that has run 
through my life, — that of being forgotten j so true, 
except the folly of being an author, has been what I 
said last year to the Prince of Wales [George IV.] : 
when he asked me if I was a Freemason, I replied, 
" No, sir ; I never was anything." 

A propos to the Prince : I am sorry you do not 
approve of my offering to kiss the Duke's hand 
when he came to see my house. I never had been 
1 Selwyn was the Magmis Apollo of the Walpole set. 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 273 

presented to him ; but moreover, as I am very se- 
cure of never being suspected to pay my court for 
interest, and certainly never seek royal personages, 
I always pique myself, when thrown in their way, upon 
showing that I know I am nobody, and know the 
distance between them and me : this I take to be 
common-sense, and do not repent of my behavior. 
If I were a grandee and in place, I would not, like 
the late Duchess of Northumberland, jig after them, 
calling them my master and my mistress. I think 
if I were their servant, I would as little, like the 
same Grace, parade before the Queen with more 
footmen than her Majesty. That was impertinent. 

I am sorry, for the third time of this letter, that I 
have no new village anecdotes to send your Lady- 
ship, since they divert you for a moment. I have 
one, but some months old. Lady Charleville, my 
neighbor, told me, three months ago, that, having 
some company with her, one of them had been to 
see Strawberry. "Pray," said another, "who is 
that Mr. Walpole?" "Lord!" cried a third, 
"don't you know the great epicure, Mr. Walpole?" 
" Pho ! " said the first, " great epicure ! you mean 
the antiquarian." There, madam, surely this an- 
ecdote may take its place in the chapter of local 
fame. If I have picked up no recent anecdotes on 
our Common, I have made a much more, to me, 
precious acquisition. It is the acquaintance of two 
young ladies of the name of Berry, whom I first saw 
last winter and who accidentally took a house here 
with their father for this season. Their story is 
singular enough to entertain you. The grandfather, 
iS 



\ 



274 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

a Scot, had a large estate in his own country, — 
^5000 a year, it is said ; and a circumstance I shall 
tell you makes it probable. The eldest son married 
for love a woman with no fortune. The old man 
was enraged, and would not see him. The wife died, 
and left these two young ladies. Their grandfather 
wished for an heir male, and pressed the widower 
to re-marry, but could not prevail, the son declar- 
ing he would consecrate himself to his daughters 
and their education. The old man did not break 
with him again, but much worse, totally disinherited 
him, and left all to his second son, who very hand- 
somely gave up ^800 a year to his elder brother. 
Mr. Berry has since carried his daughters for two or 
three years to France and Italy, and they are re- 
turned the best informed and the most perfect crea- 
tures I ever saw at their age. They are exceedingly 
sensible, entirely natural and unaffected, frank, and 
being qualified to talk on any subject, nothing is so 
easy and agreeable as their conversation, — not more 
apposite than their answers and observations. The 
eldest, I discovered by chance, understands Latin, 
and is a perfect Frenchwoman in her language. 
The younger draws charmingly, and has copied ad- 
mirably Lady Di's gypsies which I lent, though for 
the first time of her attempting colors. They are of 
pleasing figures : Mary, the eldest, sweet, with fine, 
dark eyes, that are very lively when she speaks, with 
a symmetry of face that is the more interesting from 
being pale ; Agnes, the younger, has an agreeable, 
sensible countenance, hardly to be called handsome, 
but almost. She is less animated than Mary, but 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 275 

seems, out of deference to her sister, to speak sel- 
domer, for they dote on each other, and Mary is 
always praising her sister's talents. I must even tell 
you they dress within the bounds of fashion, though 
fashionably; but without the excrescences and bal- 
conies with which modern hoydens overwhelm and 
barricade their persons. In short, good sense, in- 
formation, simplicity, and ease characterize the Berrys, 
— and this is not particularly mine, who am apt to 
be prejudiced, but the universal voice of all who know 
them. The first night I met them I would not be 
acquainted with them, having heard so much in 
their praise that I concluded they would be all pre- 
tension. The second time, in a very small company, 
I sat next to Mary, and found her an angel both 
inside and out. Now I do not know which I 
like best, except Mary's face, which is formed for a 
sentimental novel, but is ten times fitter for a fifty 
times better thing, genteel comedy. This delightful 
family comes to me almost every Sunday evening, as 
our region is too proclamatory to play at cards on 
the seventh day. I do not care a straw for cards, 
but I do disapprove of this partiality to the youngest 
child of the week ; while the other poor six days are 
treated as if they had no souls to save. I forgot to 
tell you that Mr. Berry is a little, merry man, with a 
round face, and you would not suspect him of so 
much feeling and attachment. I make no excuse 
for such minute details ; for if your Ladyship insists 
on hearing the humors of my district, you must for 
once indulge me with sending you two pearls that I 
found in my path. 



276 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 
LXXXIX. 

ACCEPTANCE OF AN INVITATION. 

To the Misses Berry. x 

February 2, 17, — 71 2 [1789]. 

I am sorry, in the sense of that word before it 
meant, like a Hebrew word, glad or sorry, that I am 
engaged this evening ; and I am at your command 
on Tuesday, as it is always my inclination to be. 
It is a misfortune that words are become so much 
the current coin of society that, like King William's 
shillings, they have no impression left, — they are so 
smooth that they mark no more to whom they first 
belonged than to whom they do belong, and are not 
worth even the twelvepence into which they may 
be changed ; but if they mean too little, they may 
seem to mean too much too, especially when an 
old man (who is often synonymous for a miser) 
parts with them. I am afraid of protesting how 
much I delight in your society, lest I should seem 
to affect being gallant ; but if two negatives make 
an affirmative, why may not two ridicules compose 
one piece of sense ? And therefore, as I am in love 
with you both, I trust it is a proof of the good sense 
of yours devotedly. 

1 The first of the series of letters addressed to these 
ladies. 

2 The date refers to his own age, — seventy-one. 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 277 

xc. 

ON DARWIN'S "BOTANIC GARDEN." 

To Miss Hannah More. 

Berkeley Square, April 22, 1789. 
Dear Madam, — As perhaps you have not yet 
seen the " Botanic Garden " (which I believe I 
mentioned to you), I lend it you to read. The 
poetry, I think, you will allow most admirable ; 
and difficult it was, no doubt. If you are not a 
naturalist as well as a poetess, perhaps you will 
lament that so powerful a talent has been wasted 
to so little purpose ; for where is the use of de- 
scribing in verse what nobody can understand with- 
out a long prosaic explanation of every article? 
It is still more unfortunate that there is not a symp- 
tom of plan in the whole poem. The lady-flowers 
and their lovers enter in pairs or trios or etc., as 
often as the couples in "Cassandra," and you are 
not a whit more interested about one heroine and 
her swain than about another. The similes are 
beautiful, fine, and sometimes sublime ; and thus the 
episodes will be better remembered than the mass 
of the poem itself, which one cannot call the sub- 
ject ; for could one call it a subject, if anybody had 
composed a poem on the matches formerly made 
in the Fleet, where, as Waitwell says, in " The Way 
of the World," they stood like couples in rows ready 
to begin a country dance? Still, I flatter myself 



278 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

you will agree with me that the author is a great 
poet, and could raise the passions, and possesses all 
the requisites of the art. I found but a single bad 
verse : in the last canto one line ends "e'er long." 
You will perhaps be surprised at meeting a truffle 
converted into a nymph, and inhabiting a palace 
studded with emeralds and rubies, like a saloon in 
the Arabian Nights ! I had a more particular mo- 
tive for sending this poem to you : you will find the 
bard espousing your poor Africans. There is be- 
sides, which will please you too, a handsome pane- 
gyric on the apostle of humanity, Mr Howard. 

Mrs. Garrick, whom I had the pleasure of meet- 
ing in her own box at Mr. Conway's play, gave me 
a much better account of your health, which de- 
lighted me. I am sure, my good friend, you par- 
take of my joy at the great success of his comedy. 
The additional character of the Abbe" pleased much : 
it was added by the advice of the players to enliven 
it ; that is, to stretch the jaws of the pit and gal- 
leries. I sighed silently, for it was originally so 
genteel and of a piece that I was sorry to have it 
tumbled by coarse applauses. But this is a secret. 
I am going to Twickenham for two days on an 
assignation with the spring, and to avoid the riotous 
devotion of to-morrow. 

A gentleman essayist has printed what he calls 
some strictures on my " Royal and Noble Authors," 
in revenge for my having spoken irreverently (on 
Bishop Burnet's authority) of the Earl of Anglesey, 
who had the honor, it seems, of being the gentle- 
man's grandfather. He asks me, by the way, why 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 279 

it was more ridiculous in the Duke of Newcastle to 
write his two comedies, than in the Duke of Buck- 
ingham to write " The Rehearsal "? Alas ! I know 
but one reason, which is, that it is less ridiculous 
to write one excellent comedy than two very bad 
ones. Peace be with such answerers ! Adieu,, 
my dear madam ! Yours most cordially. 



XCI. 

ON THE RECEIPT OF "BISHOP BONNER'S GHOST." 

To Miss Hannah More. 

Strawberry Hill, June 23, 17S9. 

Madam Hannah, — You are an errant reprobate, 
and grow wickeder and wickeder every day. You 
deserve to be treated like a negre ; and your favor- 
ite, Sunday, to which you are so partial that you 
treat the other poor six days of the week as if they 
had no souls to be saved, should, if I could have 
my will, "shine no Sabbath-day for you." Now, 
don't simper, and look as innocent as if virtue would 
not melt in your mouth. Can you deny the follow- 
ing charges? I lent you the "Botanic Garden," 
and you returned it without writing a syllable, or 
saying where you were or whither you were going, — 
I suppose for fear I should know how to direct to 
you. Why, if I did send a letter after you, could 
not you keep it three months without an answer, as 
you did last year? 

In the next place, you and your nine accomplices 



280 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

— who, by the way, are too good in keeping you 
company — have clubbed the prettiest poem imag- 
inable, and communicated it to Mrs. Boscawen, with 
injunctions not to give a copy of it, — I suppose 
because you are ashamed of having written a pane- 
gyric. Whenever you do compose a satire, you are 
ready enough to publish it, — at least, whenever you 
do, you will din one to death with it. But now, 
mind your perverseness : that very pretty novel 
poem, — and I must own it is charming, — have you 
gone and spoiled, flying in the faces of your best 
friends, the Muses7 and keeping no measures with 
them. I '11 be shot if they dictated two of the best 
lines, with two syllables too much in each, — nay, 
you have weakened one of them. 

" Ev'n Gardiner's mind " 

is far more expressive than steadfast Gardiner's; 
and, as Mrs. Boscawen says, whoever knows anything 
of Gardiner could not want that superfluous epithet ; 
and whoever does not, would not be the wiser for 
your foolish insertion. Mrs. Boscawen did not call 
it foolish, but I do. The second line, as Mesdemoi- 
selles the Muses handed it to you, miss, was, 

" Have all be free and saved," 

not, " All be free and all be saved : " the second " all 
be " is a most unnecessary tautology. The poem 
was perfect and faultless, if you could have let it 
alone. I wonder how your mischievous flippancy 
could help maiming that most new and beautiful 
expression, "sponge of sins;" I should not have 
been surprised, as you love verses too full of feet, if 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 281 

you had changed it to " that scrubbing-brush of 
sins." 

Well, I will say no more now ; but if you do not 
order me a copy of " Bonner's Ghost " incontinently, 
never dare to look my printing-house in the face 
again. Or come, I '11 tell you what : I will forgive 
all your enormities if you will let me print your 
poem. I like to filch a little immortality out of 
others, and the Strawberry press could never have 
a better opportunity. I will not haggle for the 
public ; I will be content with printing only two 
hundred copies, of which you shall have half, and 
I half. It shall cost you nothing but a yes. I only 
propose this in case you do not mean to print it 
yourself. Tell me sincerely which you like. But 
as to not printing it at all, charming and unexcep- 
tionable as it is, you cannot be so preposterous. 

I by no means have a thought of detracting from 
your own share in your own poem ; but as I do sus- 
pect that it caught some inspiration from your peru- 
sal of the " Botanic Garden," so I hope you will 
discover that my style is much improved by having 
lately studied Bruce's Travels. There I dipped, 
and not in St. Giles's Pound, where one would think 
this author had been educated. Adieu ! Your friend, 
or mortal foe, as you behave on the present occasion. 



282 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

XCII. 

WITH A CONTRIBUTION FOR CHARITY. 

To Miss Hannah More. 

Berkeley Square, Feb. 20, 1790 
It is very provoking that people must always be 
hanging or drowning themselves, or going mad, that 
you, forsooth, mistress, may have the diversion of 
exercising your pity and good- nature and charity 
and intercession, and all that bead-roll of virtues 
that make you so troublesome and amiable, when 
you might be ten times more agreeable by writing 
things that would not cost one above half-a- crown at 
a time. You are an absolutely walking hospital, and 
travel about into lone and by places, with your 
doors open to house stray casualties ! I wish at 
least that you would have some children yourself, 
that you might not be plaguing one for all the pretty 
brats that are starving and friendless. I suppose it 
was some such goody two or three thousand years 
ago that suggested the idea of an alma mater, suck- 
ling the three hundred and sixty-five bantlings of 
the Countess of Hainault. Well, as your newly 
adopted pensioners have two babes, I insist on your 
accepting two guineas for them, instead of one at 
present (that is, when you shall be present). If 
you cannot circumscribe your own charities, you 
shall not stint mine, madam, who can afford it 
much better, and who must be dunned for alms, 
and do not scramble over hedges and ditches in 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 283 

searching for opportunities of flinging away my 
money on good works. I employ mine better at 
auctions, and in buying pictures and baubles, and 
hoarding curiosities that in truth I cannot keep 
long, but that will last forever in my catalogue, and 
make me immortal ! Alas ! will they cover a mul- 
titude of sins? Adieu ! I cannot jest after that 
sentence. Yours sincerely. 



XCIII. 

A LETTER OF FAREWELL. 

To the Misses Berry. 

Sunday, Oct. 10, 1 790. 
{The day of your departure.') 

Is it possible to write to my beloved friends 
and refrain from speaking of my grief for losing 
you ? — though it is but the continuation of what I 
have felt ever since I was stunned by your intention 
of going abroad this autumn. Still I will not tire 
you with it often. In happy days I smiled, and 
called you my dear wives ; now I can only think on 
you as darling children of whom I am bereaved. 
As such I have loved and do love you ; and charm- 
ing as you both are, I have had no occasion to re- 
mind myself that I am past seventy-three. Your 
hearts, your understandings, your virtues, and the 
cruel injustice of your fate l have interested me in 

1 This alludes to their father having been disinherited by 
an uncle to whom he was heir at law, and a large property left 
to his younger brother. 



284 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

everything that concerns you ; and so far from hav- 
ing occasion to blush for any unbecoming weakness, 
I am proud of my affection for you, and very proud 
of your condescending to pass so many hours with 
a very old man, when everybody admires you and 
the most insensible allow that your good sense and 
information (I speak of both) have formed you to 
converse with the most intelligent of our sex as 
well as your own, and neither can tax you with airs 
of pretension or affectation. Your simplicity and 
natural ease set off all your other merits. All these 
graces are lost to me, alas ! when I have no time to 
lose. 

Sensible as I am to my loss, it will occupy but 
part of my thoughts till I know you safely landed, 
and arrived safely at Turin. Not till you are there, 
and I learn so, will my anxiety subside and settle 
into steady, selfish sorrow. I looked at every 
weathercock as I came along the road to-day, and 
was happy to see every one point northeast. May 
they do so to-morrow ! 

I found here the frame for Wolsey, and to-morrow 
morning Kirgate will place him in it j and then I 
shall begin pulling the little parlor to pieces, that 
it may be hung anew to receive him. I have also 
obeyed Miss Agnes, though with regret ; for on try- 
ing it, I found her Arcadia 1 would fit the place of 
the picture she condemns, which shall therefore be 
hung in its room, — though the latter should give way 
to nothing else, nor shall be laid aside, but shall hang 
where I shall see it almost as often. I long to hear 
1 A drawing by Miss Agnes Berry. 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 285 

that its dear paintress is well ; I thought her not at 
all so last night. You will tell me the truth, though 
she in her own case, and in that alone, allows her- 
self mental reservation. 

Forgive me for writing nothing to-night but about 
you two and myself. Of what can I have thought 
else? I have not spoken to a single person but my 
own servants since we parted last night. I found a 
message here from Miss Howe to invite me for this 
evening, — do you think I have not preferred stay- 
ing at home to write to you, as this must go to Lon- 
don to-morrow morning by the coach to be ready 
for Tuesday's post? My future letters shall talk of 
other things, whenever I know anything worth re- 
peating, — or perhaps any trifle, for I am determined 
to forbid myself lamentations that would weary you ; 
and the frequency of my letters will prove there is 
no forgetfulness. If I live to see you again, you will 
then judge whether I am changed ; but a friendship 
so rational and so pure as mine is, and so equal for 
both, is not likely to have any of the fickleness of 
youth, when it has none of its other ingredients. It 
was a sweet consolation to the short time that I 
may have left, to fall into such a society ; no wonder 
then that I am unhappy at that consolation being 
abridged. I pique myself on no philosophy but 
what a long use and knowledge of the world had 
given me, — the philosophy of indifference to most 
persons and events. I do pique myself on not being 
ridiculous at this very late period of my life ; but 
when there is not a grain of passion in my affection 
for you two, and when you both have the good sense 



286 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

not to be displeased at my telling you so (though I 
hope you would have despised me for the contrary) , 
I am not ashamed to say that your loss is heavy to 
me, and that I am only reconciled to it by hoping 
that a winter in Italy, and the journeys and sea air, 
will be very beneficial to two constitutions so deli- 
cate as yours. Adieu ! my dearest friends, it would 
be tautology to subscribe a name to a letter, every 
line of which would suit no other man in the world 
but the writer. 



XCIV. 

ON SOME NEW BOOKS. 

To Miss Berry. 
Berkeley Square, May 26, 1791. 

The rest of my letter must be literary, for we 
have no news. Boswell's book is gossiping, but 
having numbers of proper names, would be more 
readable, at least by me, were it reduced from 
two volumes to one ; but there are woful longueurs, 
both about his hero and himself, the fidus Achates, 
about whom one has not the smallest curiosity. But 
I wrong the original Achates : one is satisfied with 
his fidelity in keeping his master's secrets and weak- 
nesses, which modern led captains betray for their 
patron's glory and to hurt their own enemies, — which 
Boswell has done shamefully, particularly against 
Mrs. Piozzi and Mrs. Montagu and Bishop Percy. 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 287 

Dr. Blagden says justly that it is a new kind of 
libel, by which you may abuse anybody, by saying 
some dead person said so and so of somebody 
alive. Often, indeed, Johnson made the most brutal 
speeches to living persons ; for though he was good- 
natured at bottom, he was very ill-natured at top. 
He loved to dispute to show his superiority. If 
his opponents were weak, he, told them they were 
fools ; if they vanquished him, he was scurrilous, — 
to nobody more than to Boswell himself, who was 
contemptible for nattering him so grossly, and for 
enduring the coarse things he was continually vomit- 
ing on Boswell's own country, Scotland. I expected, 
amongst the excommunicated, to find myself, but 
am very gently treated. I never would be in the 
least acquainted with Johnson ; or, as Boswell calls 
it, I had not a just value for him, — which the bio- 
grapher imputes to my resentment for the Doctor's 
putting bad arguments (purposely, out of Jacobi- 
tism) into the speeches which he wrote fifty years 
ago for my father in the " Gentleman's Magazine ; " 
which I did not read then, or ever knew Johnson 
wrote till Johnson died, nor have looked at since. 
'Johnson's blind Toryism and known brutality kept 
me aloof; nor did I ever exchange a syllable with 
him : nay, I do not think I ever was in a room 
with him six times in my days. Boswell came to 
me, said Dr. Johnson was writing the " Lives of the 
Poets," and wished I would give him anecdotes of 
Mr. Gray. I said, very coldly, I had given what I 
knew to Mr. Mason. Boswell hummed and hawed, 
and then dropped, " I suppose you know Dr. John- 



288 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

son does not admire Mr. Gray." Putting as much 
contempt as I could into my look and tone, I said, 
" Dr. Johnson don't ! — hump ! " — and with that 
monosyllable ended our interview. After the Doc- 
tor's death, Burke, Sir Joshua Reynolds, and Bos- 
well sent an ambling circular-letter to me, begging 
subscriptions for a monument for him, — the two 
last, I think, impertinently, as they could not but 
know my opinion, and could not suppose I would 
contribute to a monument for one who had en- 
deavored, poor soul ! to degrade my friend's su- 
perlative poetry. I would not deign to write an 
answer, but sent down word by my footman, as 
I would have done to parish officers with a brief, 
that I would not subscribe. In the two new vol- 
umes Johnson says, and very probably did, or is 
made to say, that Gray's poetry is dull, and that 
he was a dull man ! The same oracle dislikes 
Prior, Swift, and Fielding. If an elephant could 
write a book, perhaps one that had read a great deal 
would say that an Arabian horse is a very clumsy, 
ungraceful animal. Pass to a better chapter ! 

Burke has published another pamphlet 1 against 
the French Revolution, in which he attacks it still 
more grievously. The beginning is very good ; but 
it is not equal, nor quite so injudicious as parts of 
its predecessor, — is far less brilliant, as well as much 
shorter; but were it ever so long, his mind over- 
flows with such a torrent of images that he can- 
not be tedious. His invective against Rousseau is 

1 This was the Letter from Mr. Burke to a Member of the 
National Assembly. 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 289 

admirable, just, and new. Voltaire he passes almost 
contemptuously. I wish he had dissected Mirabeau 
too ; and I grieve that he has omitted the violation 
of the consciences of the clergy, nor stigmatized 
those universal plunderers, the National Assembly, 
who gorge themselves with eighteen livres a day, — 
which to many of them would, three years ago, 
have been astonishing opulence. 

When you return, I shall lend you three volumes 
in quarto of another work, with which you will be 
delighted. They are State letters in the reigns of 
Henry the Eighth, Mary, Elizabeth, and James ; be- 
ing the correspondence of the Talbot and Howard 
families, given by a Duke of Norfolk to the Herald's 
Office ; where they have lain for a century neglected, 
buried under dust, and unknown, till discovered by 
a Mr. Lodge, a genealogist, who, to gratify his pas- 
sion, procured to be made a pursuivant. Oh, how 
curious they are ! Henry seizes an alderman who 
refused to contribute to a benevolence, sends him 
to the army on the Borders, orders him to be ex- 
posed in the front line, and if that does not do, to 
be treated with the utmost rigor of military disci- 
pline. His daughter Bess is not less a Tudor. The 
mean, unworthy treatment of the Queen of Scots is 
striking ; and you will find how Elizabeth's jealousy 
of her crown and her avarice were at war, and how 
the more ignoble passion predominated. But the 
most amusing passage is one in a private letter, as 
it paints the awe of children for their parents a little 
differently from modern habitudes. Mr. Talbot, 
second son of the Earl of Shrewsbury, was a mera- 
19 



290 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

ber of the House of Commons, and was married. 
He writes to the Earl his father, and tells him that 
a young woman of a very good character has been 
recommended to him for chambermaid to his wife, 
and if his Lordship does not disapprove of it, he 
will hire her. There are many letters of news that 
are very entertaining too. But it is nine o'clock, 
and I must go to Lady Cecilia's. 



xcv. 

ON HIS ACCESSION TO THE TITLE EARL OF 
ORFORD. 

To Miss Hannah More. 

Berkeley Square, Jan. 1, 1792. 
My much-esteemed Friend, — I have not so 
long delayed answering your letter from the pitiful 
revenge of recollecting how long your pen is fetch- 
ing breath before it replies to mine. Oh ! no ; you 
know I love to heap coals of kindness on your head, 
and to draw you into little sins, that you may for- 
give yourself, by knowing your time was employed 
on big virtues. On the contrary, you would be 
revenged ; for here have you, according to your 
notions, inveigled me into the fracture of a com- 
mandment, — for I am writing to you on a Sunday, 
being the first moment of leisure that I have had 
since I received your letter. It does not indeed 
clash with my religious ideas, as I hold paying one's 
debts as good a deed as praying and reading ser- 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 291 

mons for a whole day in every week, when it is 
impossible to fix the attention to one course of 
thinking for so many hours for fifty-two days in 
every year. Thus you see I can preach too. But 
seriously, and indeed I am little disposed to cheer- 
fulness now, I am overwhelmed with troubles and 
with business, — and business that I do not under- 
stand ; law, and the management of a ruined estate, 
are subjects ill-suited to a head that never studied 
anything that in worldly language is called useful. 
The tranquillity of my remnant of life will be lost, 
or so perpetually interrupted that I expect little 
comfort ; not that I am already intending to grow 
rich, but the moment one is supposed so, there 
are so many alert to turn one to their own account 
that I have more letters to write to satisfy, or rather 
to dissatisfy them, than about my own affairs, though 
the latter are all confusion. I have such missives, 
on agriculture, pretensions to livings, offers of taking 
care of my game as I am incapable of it, self- 
recommendations of making my robes, and round 
hints of taking out my writ, that at least I may name 
a proxy, and give my dormant conscience to some- 
body or other ! I trust you think better of my 
heart and understanding than to suppose that I 
have listened to any one of these new friends. Yet, 
though I have negatived all, I have been forced to 
answer some of them before you ; and that will 
convince you how cruelly ill I have passed my time 
lately, besides having been made ill with vexation 
and fatigue. But I am tolerably well again. 

For the other empty metamorphosis that has 



292 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

happened to the outward man, you do me justice 
in concluding that it can do nothing but teaze me ; 
it is being called names in one's old age. I had 
rather be my Lord Mayor, for then I should keep 
the nickname but a year ; and mine I may retain a 
little longer, — not that at seventy- five I reckon on 
becoming my Lord Methusalem. Vainer, however, 
I believe I am already become ; for I have wasted 
almost two pages about myself, and said not a tittle 
about your health, which I most cordially rejoice to 
hear you are recovering, and as fervently hope you 
will entirely recover. I have the highest opinion of 
the element of water as a constant beverage ; having 
so deep a conviction of the goodness and wisdom of 
Providence that I am persuaded that when it in- 
dulged us in such a luxurious variety of eatables, 
and gave us but one drinkable, it intended that our 
sole liquid should be both wholesome and correc- 
tive. Your system I know is different; you hold 
that mutton and water were the only cock and hen 
that were designed for our nourishment ; but I am 
apt to doubt whether draughts of water for six weeks 
are capable of restoring health, though some are 
strongly impregnated with mineral and other parti- 
cles. Yet you have staggered me ; the Bath water 
by your account is, like electricity, compounded of 
contradictory qualities : the one attracts and repels ; 
the other turns a shilling yellow, and whitens your 
jaundice. I shall hope to see you (when is that to 
be ?) without alloy. 

I must finish, wishing you three hundred and 
thirteen days of happiness for the new year that is 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 293 

arrived this morning : the fifty-two that you hold 
in commendam, I have no doubt will be rewarded 
as such good intentions deserve. Adieu, my too 
good friend ! My direction shall talk superciliously 
to the postman ; 2 but do let me continue un- 
changeably your faithful and sincere 

Hor. Walpole. 2 

XCVI. 

ON FRENCH AFFAIRS. 

To the Countess of Ossory. 

Strawberry Hill, Nov. 10, 1793. 

I return your Ladyship the lines as you ordered, 
and do not recollect having seen them before. 
They may have been written by Mary, 3 for I think 
she did write some French verses, — and if she did 
write these, very poorly too, both as to the language 
and poetry, as far as I can read them, for they are 
very badly transcribed. They ought to be well 
authenticated, if the original paper exists. Has it 
lain at Fotheringhay till now, and yet is preserved, 
and was never seen before? I am a little in- 
credulous, and as incurious, for the lines only excite 
compassion, no admiration. 

I am much obliged to your Ladyship's inquiries. 

1 He means franking his letter by his newly acquired title 
of Earl of Orford. 

2 This is the last letter signed " Horace Walpole." He 
not infrequently styled himself "The uncle of the late Earl 
of Orford." 

3 Queen of Scots. 



294 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

I cannot say I am very well ; yet as I am not likely 
at my age to improve, it is not worth a new para- 
graph : nor can I send you one that deserves to 
be sent. I have not seen a face these three days 
but of my own servants ; and the wheelbarrow that 
j carries away the dead leaves, passes its time in a 
livelier manner than I do. I might seek for more 
diversion ; yet not being at all convinced that I should 
find it, I am content to let the days pass as they 
please; and when they bring me no disturbance, I 
am not of a temper to invent any for myself. If old 
folks would be satisfied with tranquillity, they would 
find more of the attainable than any former objects 
of their pursuits. Nature furnishes them with in- 
sensibility to others ; but then they are often apt to 
substitute the love of money for the love of their 
friends, and are so foolish as not to reflect that 
every half-year's interest of their money costs them 
half a year of their life. I don't know whether any 
moralist ever made this reflection ; if there did, it 
has been, like other truths, of little effect. The 
French philosophers take another method : they do 
not demonstrate the inefricacy of moralizing. On 
the contrary, lest it should have any operation, they 
expunge all morality, and attempt to establish uni- 
versal liberty by destruction of all religion and all 
the terrors of futurity. Men would certainly be per- 
fectly free, if restrained by no government without, 
and by no apprehensions within. The system is a 
vast experiment. Fortunately, many of the in- 
ventors have been, and probably more of its pro- 
pagators will be, the victims of such diabolic 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 295 

tenets; and as some axioms still maintain their 
solidity, that of extremes meeting grows every day 
more uncontrovertible. Turkish despotism, that 
depopulated so many beautiful provinces and islands 
for the mere luxury of retaining the useless soil, is 
copied continually by French democracy ; and the 
Convention exults in the destruction of Lyons, and 
their own cities and towns, as if they had put all 
Vienna to the sword. It would be curious, could 
one know, of the supposed twenty-four millions of 
inhabitants of France five years ago, how many it 
has lost by emigrations, banishment, massacres, 
executions, battles, sieges, captives made, etc., and 
by what is never counted in wars, the hosts of 
families of peasants whose cottages and hovels have 
been destroyed by foragers and march of armies. 
Famine too, I suppose, could produce a long bill of 
those that have fallen in her department. 

There is another item not yet felt, but that will 
be a heavy one. It is allowed that all the new 
levies that have been forced to the frontiers, espe- 
cially to Maubeuge, are lads of fifteen, sixteen, and 
seventeen years of age. This is some drawback on 
population. 

One might make some deduction from the ex- 
tinction of the species by the cessation of monastic 
vows ; but they had ceased to a considerable degree 
before the Revolution. When I was last at Paris I 
had observed how rarely I met a monk or friar 
about the streets, and made the remark to a very 
intelligent person, asking him whether the writings 
of Voltaire and the philosophers had made the 



296 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

religious ashamed or unwilling to appear in public ? 
" No," said he, " but those writings have done 
much more : they have so damped professions that 
few men make the vows. In that convent," said 
he, pointing to a very large one in the Rue St. 
Denis, " there are literally but two friars." This is 
a curious fact, madam, and I am glad I have 
scribbled till I recollected it. It will make you 
some amends for the rest of my common-place. 



XCVII. 

DECLINING THE DEDICATION OF A TRANSLATION 
OF AULUS GELLIUS. 

To the Rev. Willia7n Beloe. 

Strawberry Hill, Dec, 2, 1794. 
I do beg and beseech you, good sir, to forgive 
me if I cannot possibly consent to receive the 
dedication you are so kind and partial as to pro- 
pose to me. I have in the most positive and al- 
most uncivil manner refused a dedication or two 
lately. Compliments on virtues which the persons 
addressed, like me, seldom possessed, are happily 
exploded and laughed out of use. Next to being 
ashamed of having good qualities bestowed on me 
to which I should have no title, it would hurt to be 
praised on my erudition, which is most superficial, 
and on my trifling writings, all of which turn on 
most trifling subjects. They amused me while 
writing them; may have amused a few persons; 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 297 

but have nothing solid enough to preserve them 
from being forgotten with other things of as light a 
nature. I would not have your judgment called in 
question hereafter, if somebody reading your Aulus 
Gellius should ask, "What were those writings of 
Lord O. which Mr. Beloe so much commends? 
Was Lord O. more than one of the mob of gentlemen 
who wrote with ease?''' Into that class I must 
sink; and I had rather do so imperceptibly than 
to be plunged down to it by the interposition of 
the hand of a friend who could not gainsay the 
sentence. 

For your own sake, my good sir, as well as in 
pity to my feelings, who am sore at your offering 
what I cannot accept, restrain the address to a mere 
inscription. You are allowed to be an excellent 
translator of classic authors ; how unclassic would 
a dedication in the old-fashioned manner appear ! 
If you had published a new edition of Herodotus 
or Aulus Gellius, would you have ventured to 
prefix a Greek or Latin dedication to some modern 
lord with a Gothic title ? Still less, had those ad- 
dresses been in vogue at Rome, would any Roman 
author have inscribed his work to Marcus, the in- 
competent son of Cicero, and told the unfortunate 
offspring of so great a man of his high birth and 
declension of ambition ? — which would have excited 
a laugh on poor Marcus, who, whatever may have 
been said of him, had more sense than to leave 
proofs to the public of his extreme inferiority to his 
father. 



298 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 



XCVIII. 

WITH A SUBSCRIPTION.— COMMENTS ON THE FRENCH 
REVOLUTION. 

To Miss Hannah More. 

Berkeley Square, 
Saturday Night, Jan. 24, 1 795. 

My best Madam, — I will never more complain of 
your silence ; for I am perfectly convinced that you 
have no idle, no unemployed moments. Your in- 
defatigable benevolence is incessantly occupied in 
good works, and your head and your heart make 
the utmost use of the excellent qualities of both. 
You have given proofs of the talents of one, and 
you certainly do not wrap the still more precious 
talent of the other in a napkin. Thank you a 
thousand times for your most ingenious plan ; may 
great success reward you ! 

I sent one instantly to the Duchess of Gloucester, 
whose piety and zeal imitate yours at a distance ; 
but she says she cannot afford to subscribe just at 
this severe moment, when the poor so much want 
her assistance, but she will on the thaw, and should 
have been flattered by receiving a plan from your- 
self. I sent another to Lord Harcourt, who, I 
trust, will show it to a much greater lady; and I 
repeated some of the facts you told me of the foul 
fiends, and their anti-J/tf/^ activity. I sent to Mr. 
White for half a dozen more of your plans, and 
will distribute them wherever I have hopes of their 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 299 

taking root and blossoming. To-morrow I will 
send him my subscription, and I flatter myself you 
will not think it a breach of Sunday, nor will I make 
this long, that I may not widen that fracture. 
Good night ! How calm and comfortable must 
your slumbers be on the pillow of every day's 
good deeds ! 

Monday. 
Yesterday was dark as midnight. Oh, that it 
may be the darkest day in all respects that we shall 
see ! But these are themes too voluminous and 
dismal for a letter, and which your zeal tells me 
you feel too intensely for me to increase, when you 
are doing all in your power to counteract them. 
One of my grievances is that the sanguinary in- 
humanity of the times has almost poisoned one's 
compassion, and makes one abhor so many thou- 
sands of our own species, and rejoice when they 
suffer for their crimes. I could feel no pity on 
reading the account of the death of Condorcet (if 
true, though I doubt it). He was one of the great- 
est monsters exhibited by history, and is said to 
have poisoned himself from famine and fear of 
the guillotine ; and would be a new instance of 
what I suggested to you for a tract, to show that 
though we must not assume a pretension to judging 
of divine judgments, yet we may believe that the 
economy of Providence has so disposed causes and 
consequences that such villains as Danton, Robes- 
pierre, the Duke of Orleans, etc., do but dig pits 
for themselves. I will check myself, or I shall 
wander into the sad events of the last five years, 



300 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

down to the rage of party that has sacrificed Hol- 
land. What a fund for reflection and prophetic 
apprehension ! May we have as much wisdom and 
courage to stem our malevolent enemies as it is 
plain, to our lasting honor, we have had charity to 
the French emigrants, and have bounty for the 
poor who are suffering in this dreadful season ! 

Adieu, thou excellent woman ! thou reverse of 
that hyaena in petticoats, Mrs. Wollstonecraft, who 
to this day discharges her ink and gall on Maria 
Antoinette, whose unparalleled sufferings have not 
yet stanched that Alecto's blazing ferocity. Adieu ! 
adieu ! Yours from my heart. 

P. S. — I have subscribed five guineas at Mr. 
White's to your plan. 



XCIX. 

ON THE RECEIPT OF "LORENZO DE' MEDICI." 
To Willia7n Roscoe, Esq. 

Berkeley Square, April 4, 1795. 
To judge of my satisfaction and gratitude on re- 
ceiving the very acceptable present of your book, 
sir, you should have known my extreme impatience 
for it from the instant Mr. Edwards had kindly 
favored me with the first chapters. You may con- 
sequently conceive the mortification I felt at not 
being able to thank you immediately both for the 
volume and the obliging letter that accompanied it. 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 301 

by my right arm and hand being swelled and 
rendered quite immovable and useless, of which 
you will perceive the remains if you can read these 
lines, which I am forcing myself to write, not with- 
out pain, the first moment I have power to hold 
a pen; and it will cost me some time, I believe, 
before I can finish my whole letter, earnest as I am, 
sir, to give a loose to my gratitude. 

If you ever had the pleasure of reading such a 
delightful book as your own, imagine, sir, what a 
comfort it must be to receive such an anodyne in 
the midst of a fit of the gout that has already lasted 
above nine weeks, and which at first I thought 
might carry me to Lorenzo de' Medici before he 
should come to me ! 

The complete volume has more than answered 
the expectations which the sample had raised. The 
Grecian simplicity of the style is preserved through- 
out ; the same judicious candor reigns in every page ; 
and without allowing yourself that liberty of indul- 
ging your own bias towards good or against criminal 
characters, which over-rigid critics prohibit, your 
artful candor compels your readers to think with 
you without seeming to take a part yourself. You 
have shown from his own virtues, abilities, and 
heroic spirit why Lorenzo deserved to have Mr. 
Roscoe for his biographer. And since you have 
been so, sir (for he was not completely known be- 
fore, at least not out of Italy), I shall be extremely 
mistaken if he is not henceforth allowed to be, 
in various lights, one of the most excellent and 
greatest men with whom we are well acquainted, 



302 LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 

especially if we reflect on the shortness of his life and 
the narrow sphere in which he had to act. Perhaps 
I ought to blame my own ignorance that I did not 
know Lorenzo as a beautiful poet ; I confess I did 
not. Now I do, I own I admire some of his son- 
nets more than several — yes, even of Petrarch ; 
for Lorenzo's are frequently more clear, less alembi- 
ques, and not inharmonious, as Petrarch's often are 
from being too crowded with words, for which 
room is made by numerous elisions, which prevent 
the softening alternacy of vowels and consonants. 
That thicket of words was occasioned by the embar- 
rassing nature of the sonnet, — a form of composi- 
tion I do not love, and which is almost intolerable 
in any language but Italian, which furnishes such a 
profusion of rhymes. To our tongue the sonnet is 
mortal, and the parent of insipidity. The imitation 
in some degree of it was extremely noxious to a 
true poet, our Spenser; and he was the more 
injudicious by lengthening his stanza in a language 
so barren of rhymes as ours, and in which several 
words whose terminations are of similar sounds are 
so rugged, uncouth, and unmusical. The conse- 
quence was, that many lines which he forced into 
the service to complete the quota of his stanza are 
unmeaning, or silly, or tending to weaken the 
thought he would express. 

Well, sir, but if you have led me to admire the 
compositions of Lorenzo, you have made me intim- 
ate with another poet, of whom I had never heard 
nor had the least suspicion, and who, though writing 
in a less harmonious language than Italian, outshines 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 303 

an able master of that country, as may be estimated 
by the fairest of all comparisons, — which is, when 
one of each nation versifies the same ideas and 
thoughts. 

That novel poet I boldly pronounce is Mr. Ros- 
coe. Several of his translations of Lorenzo are 
superior to the originals, and the verses more 
poetic ; nor am I bribed to give this opinion by the 
present of your book, nor by any partiality, nor by 
the surprise of finding so pure a writer of history as 
able a poet. Some good judges to whom I have 
shown your translations entirely agree with me. I 
will name one most competent judge, Mr. Hoole, 
so admirable a poet himself, and such a critic in 
Italian, as he has proved by a translation of Ariosto. 
That I am not flattering you, sir, I will demon- 
strate ; for I am not satisfied with one essential line 
in your version of the most beautiful, I think, of all 
Lorenzo's stanzas. It is his description of Jealousy, 
in page 268, equal, in my humble opinion, to 
Dryden's delineations of the Passions, and the last 
line of which is — 

" Mai dorme, ed ostinata a se sol cred." 

The thought to me is quite new, and your trans- 
lation I own does not come up to it. Mr. Hoole 
and I hammered at it, but could not content our- 
selves. Perhaps by altering your last couplet you 
may enclose the whole sense, and make it equal to 
the preceding six. 

I will not ask your pardon, sir, for taking so 
much liberty with you. You have displayed so 



304 LETTERS OF HORACE W A LP OLE. 

much candor and so much modesty, and are so free 
from pretensions, that I am confident you will allow 
that truth is the sole ingredient that ought to com- 
pose deserved incense ; and if ever commendation 
was sincere, no praise ever flowed with purer vera- 
city than all I have said in this letter does from 
the heart of, sir, your infinitely obliged, humble 
servant. 



C. 

PICTURE OF HIS OLD AGE. 
To the Countess of Ossory. 

January 15, 1797. 1 

My dear Madam, — You distress me infinitely 
by showing my idle notes, which I cannot conceive 
can amuse anybody. My old-fashioned breeding 
impels me every now and then to reply to the 
letters you honor me with writing, but in truth very 
unwillingly, for I seldom can have anything partic- 
ular to say. I scarce go out of my own house, and 
then only to two or three very private places, where 
I see nobody that really knows anything, and what 
I learn comes from newspapers, that collect intel- 
ligence from coffee-houses, — consequently what I 
neither believe nor report. At home I see only 
a few charitable elders, except about fourscore 
nephews and nieces of various ages, who are each 

1 Six weeks later, March 2, 1797, Lord Orford died, and 
was buried with his family in the church at Houghton. 



LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. 305 

brought to me about once a year, to stare at me as 
the Methusalem of the family, and they can only 
speak of their own contemporaries, which interest me 
no more than if they talked of their dolls or bats 
and balls. Must not the result of all this, madam, 
make me a very entertaining correspondent? And 
can such letters be worth showing? or can I have 
any spirit when so old and reduced to dictate ? 

Oh, my good madam, dispense with me from 
such a task, and think how it must add to it to 
apprehend such letters being shown ! Pray send me 
no more such laurels, which I desire no more than 
their leaves when decked with a scrap of tinsel and 
stuck on twelfth-cakes that lie on the shop-boards of 
pastry-cooks at Christmas. I shall be quite con- 
tent with a sprig of rosemary thrown after me when 
the parson of the parish commits my dust to dust. 
Till then pray, madam, accept the resignation of your 
ancient servant, 

Orford. 



20 



SESAME AND LILIES. 

THREE LECTURES BY JOHN RUSKIN. 

I. Of Kings' Treasures. 
II. Of Queens' Gardens. 
III. Of the Mystery of Life. 
i2mo, 201 pages, gilt top. Price, #1.00. 

In half calf or half morocco, gilt top, $2.75. 
In limp russia or limp morocco, gilt edges, $3.50. 



One of the most popular as well as most valuable of Ruskin's 
works is " Sesame and Lilies," and this has been brought out by 
McClurg & Co. in a neat and handy volume of good print and 
excellent paper. The publishers have wisely inserted in this volume 
Ruskin's admirable and thoroughly characteristic preface which he 
prepared for the new and revised edition of his works in 1871. 
The size, shape, and compactness of this issue make it an admira- 
ble pocket companion for desultory reading in the cars, in the 
woods, or at the shore. — Evening Tratiscript , Boston. 

Other editions of this notable and popular book have been 
printed, but none so tastefully as this. Of the book itself it may 
not be inopportune to say that it shows the author at his best, 
being devoted to life instead of art, and embodying Ruskin's ear- 
nestness and gift of language without calling attention to any of 
his oddities and hobbies. — Herald, New York. 

It would be hard to find a better book to put into the hands of a 
youth — boy or girl — at that epoch of life when the spiritual and 
intellectual faculties seem to leap out with a bound from the chrysa- 
lis of the animal nature and determine their direction for life. — 
Home Journal, New York. 

The book is one by all means to be commended to young women 
and young men who care for refinement of character and purity of 
heart and earnestness of purpose, and who are able to appreciate 
noble thought clothed in exquisite diction. — Evangelist, New York. 



Sold by all booksellers, or mailed, on receipt of price, by 

A. C. McCLURG & CO., Publishers, 

Cor. Wabash Ave. and Madison St., Chicago. 



THE STANDARD OPERAS. Their 
Plots, their Music, and their Composers. By 
George P. Upton, author of " Woman in Music," 
etc., etc. 

X2mo, flexible cloth, yellow edges $150 

The same, extra gilt, gilt edges 200 



"Mr. Upton has performed a service that can hardly be toe 
highly appreciated, in collecting the plots, music, and the com- 
posers of the standard operas, to the number of sixty-four, and 
bringing them together in one perfectly arranged volume. . . . 
His work is one simply invaluable to the general reading pub- 
lic. Technicalities are avoided, the aim being to give to musi- 
cally uneducated lovers of the opera a clear understanding of the 
works they hear. It is description, not criticism, and calculated 
to greatly increase the intelligent enjoyment of music."— Boston 
Traveller. 

" Among the multitude of handbooks which are published 
every year, and are described by easy-going writers of book- 
notices as supplying a long-felt want, we know of none which 
so completely carries out the intention of the writer as ' The 
Standard Operas,' by Mr. George P. Upton, whose object is to 
present to his readers a comprehensive sketch of each of the 
operas contained in the modern repertory. . . . There are 
thousands of music-loving people who will be glad to have the 
kind of knowledge which Mr. Upton has collected for their 
benefit, and has cast in a clear and compact form." — R. H. 
Stoddard, in " Evening Mail and Express " (A T ew York). 

"The summaries of the plots are so clear, logical, and well 
written, that one can read them with real pleasure, which cannot 
be said of the ordinary operatic synopses. But the most im- 
portant circumstance is that Mr. Upton's book is fully abreast 
of the times." — The Nation [New York). 



Sold by all booksellers, or mailed, post-paid, on receipt 
of price, by 

A. C. McCLURG & CO., Publishers, 
Cor. Wabash Ave. and Madison St., Chicago. 



THE STANDARD ORATORIOS. 
Their Stories, their Music, and their Composers. A 
Handbook. By George P. Upton. 121110, 335 pages, 

yellow edges, price, #1.50; extra gilt, gilt edges, $2.00. 

In half calf, gilt top .... $3.25 

In half morocco, gilt edges . 3.75 

In tree calf, gilt edges . . . 5.50 

• 

Music lovers are under a new obligation to Mr. Upton for this 
companion to his ''Standard Operas," —two books which de- 
serve to be placed on the same shelf with Grove's and Riemann's 
musical dictionaries. — The Nation, New York. 

Mr. George P. Upton has followed in the lines that he laid 
down in his " Standard Operas," and has produced an admira- 
ble handwork, which answers every purpose that such a volume 
is designed to answer, and which is certain to be popular now 
and for years to come. — The Mail and Express, New York. 

Like the valuable art hand-books of Mrs. Jamison, these 
volumes contain a world of interesting information, indispensable 
to critics and art amateurs. The volume under review is ele- 
gantly and succinctly written, and the subjects are handled in a 
thoroughly comprehensive manner. — Public Opinion, Wash- 
ington- 

The book is a masterpiece of skilful handling, charming the 
reader with its pure English style, and keeping his attention 
always awake in an arrangement of matter which makes each 
succeeding page and chapter fresh in interest and always full 
of instruction, while always entertaining. — 'The Standard, 
Chicago 

The author of this book has done a real service to the vast 
number of people who, while they are lovers of music, have 
neither the leisure nor inclination to become deeply versed in its 
literature. . . . The information conveyed is of just the sort that 
the average of cultivated people will welcome as an aid to com- 
prehending and talking about this species of musical composi- 
tion. — Church Magazine, Philadelphia. 
♦ 

Sold by all booksellers, or mailed on receipt of price ', by 

A. C. McCLURG & CO., Publishers, 

Cor. Wabash Ave. and Madison St., Chicago. 



THE STANDARD CANTATAS. Their 
Stories, their Music, and their Composers. A Hand- 
book. By George P. Upton. i2mo, 367 pages, yellow 
edges, price, #1.50 ; extra gilt, gilt edges, #2.00. 

In half calf, gilt top .... $3.25 
In half morocco, gilt edges . 3.75 
In tree calf, gilt edges . . . 5.50 



The " Standard Cantatas " forms the third volume in the uni-. 
form series which already includes the now well known " Stan- 
dard Operas" and the " Standard Oratorios." This latest work 
deals with a class of musical compositions, midway between the 
opera and the oratorio, which is growing rapidly in favor both 
with composers and audiences. 

As in the two former works, the subject is treated, so far as 
possible, in an untechnical manner, so that it may satisfy the 
needs of musically uneducated music lovers, and add to their en- 
joyment by a plain statement of the story of the cantata and a 
popular analysis of its music, with brief pertinent selections from 
its poetical text. 

The book includes a comprehensive essay on the origin of the 
cantata, and its development from rude beginnings ; biographical 
sketches of the composers ; carefully prepared descriptions of 
the plots and the music ; and an appendix containing the names 
and dates of composition of all the best known cantatas from the 
earliest times. 

This series of works on popular music has steadily grown in 
favor since the appearance of the first volume on the Operas. 
When the series is completed, as it will be next year by a volume 
on the Standard Symphonies, it will be, as the New York 
" Nation ' has said, indispensable to every musical library. 



Sold by all booksellers, or mailed on receipt of price, by 
A. C. McCLURG & CO., Publishers, 

Cor. Wabash Ave. and Madison St., Chicago. 



THE STANDARD SYMPHONIES. 
Their History, their Music, and their Composers. 
A Handbook. By George P. Upton. i2mo, 321 pages, 
yellow edges, price #1.50; extra gilt, gilt edges, #2.00. 

In half calf, gilt top . . . . $3 25 
In half morocco, gilt edges . 3.75 
In tree calf, gilt edges . . . 5.30 



The usefulness of this handbook cannot be doubted. Its 
pages are packed full of these fascinating renderings. The 
accounts of each composer are succinct and yet sufficient. The 
author has done a genuine service to the world of music lovers. 
The comprehension of orchestral work of the highest character 
is aided efficiently by this volume. The mechanical execution 
of the volume is in harmony with its subject. No worthier 
volume can be found to put into the hands of an amateur or a 
friend of music. — Public Opinion, Washington. 

None who have seen the previous books of Mr. Upton will 
need assurance that this is as indispensable as the others to one 
who would listen intelligently to that better class of music which 
musicians congratulate themselves Americans are learning to 
appreciatively enjoy. — Home Journal, New York. 

There has never been, in this country at least, so thorough an 
attempt to collate the facts of programme music. ... As a 
definite helper in some cases and as a refresher in others we 
believe Mr. Upton's book to have a lasting value. . . . The 
book, in brief, shows enthusiastic and honorable educational 
purpose, good taste, and sound scholarship. — The American, 
Philadelphia. 

Upton's books should be read and studied by all who desire to 
acquaint themselves with the facts and accomplishments in these 
interesting forms of musical composition. — The Voice. New 
York. 

It is written in a style that cannot fail to stimulate the reader, 
if also a student of music, to strive to find for himself the under- 
lying meanings of the compositions of the great composers. 
It contains, besides, a vast amount of information about the 
symphony, its evolution and structure, with sketches of the com- 
posers, and a detailed technical description of a few symphonic 
models. It meets a recognized want of all concert goers. — 
The Chantauquan. 

♦ 

Sold by all booksellers, or mailed on receipt of price, by 

A. C. McCLURG & CO., Publishers, 

Cor. Wabash Ave. and Madison St., Chicago. 



THE STORY OF TONTY. 

AN HISTORICAL ROMANCE. 

By Mrs. Mary Hartwell Catherwood. 
i2mo, 224 pages. Price, $1.25. 



" The Story of Tonty " is eminently a Western story, beginning 
at Montreal, tarrying at Fort Frontenac, and ending at the old fort 
at Starved Rock, on the Illinois River. It weaves the adventures 
of the two great explorers, the intrepid La Salle and his faithful 
lieutenant, Tonty, into a tale as thrilling and romantic as the de- 
scriptive portions are brilliant and vivid. It is superbly illustrated 
with twenty-three masterly drawings by Mr. Enoch Ward. 

Such tales as this render service past expression to the cause of his- 
tory. They weave a spell in which old chronicles are vivified and breathe 
out human life Mrs. Catherwood, in thus bringing out from the treasure- 
houses of half- forgotten historical record things new and old, has set her- 
self one of the worthiest literary tasks of her generation, and is showing 
herself finely adequate to its fulfilment. — Transcript, Boston. 

A powerful story by a writer newly sprung to fame. . . . All the 
century we have been waiting for the deft hand that could put flesh upon 
the dry bones of our early heroes. Here is a recreation indeed. . . . One 
comes from the reading of the romance with a quickened interest in our 
early national history, and a profound admiration for the art that can so 
transport us to the dreamful realms where fancy is monarch of fact. — 
Press, Philadelphia. 

"The Story of Tonty" is full of the atmosphere of its time. It 
betrays an intimate and sympathetic knowledge of the great age of ex- 
plorers, and it is altogether a charming piece of work. — Christian 
Union, New York. 

Original in treatment, in subject, and in all the details of mise en 
scene, it must stand unique among recent romances. — News, Chicago. 



Sold by all booksellers, or mailed, on receipt of price, by 

A. C. McCLURG & CO., Publishers, 

Cor. Wabash Ave. and Madison St., Chicago. 



LETTERS OF HORACE W A LP OLE. 305 

brought to me about once a year, to stare at me as 
the Methusalem of the family, and they can only 
speak of their own contemporaries, which interest me 
no more than if they talked of their dolls or bats 
and balls. Must not the result of all this, madam, 
make me a very entertaining correspondent? And 
can such letters be worth showing? or can I have 
any spirit when so old and reduced to dictate ? 

Oh, rny good madam, dispense with me from 
such a task, and think how it must add to it to 
apprehend such letters being shown ! Pray send me 
no more such laurels, which I desire no more than 
their leaves when decked with a scrap of tinsel and 
stuck on twelfth-cakes that lie on the shop-boards of 
pastry-cooks at Christmas. I shall be quite con- 
tent with a sprig of rosemary thrown after me when 
the parson of the parish commits my dust to dust. 
Till then pray, madam, accept the resignation of your 
ancient servant, 

Orford. 



20 



SESAME AND LILIES. 

THREE LECTURES BY JOHN RTJSKIN. 

I. Of Kings' Treasures. 
II. Of Queens' Gardens. 
III. Of the Mystery of Life. 
i2mo, 201 pages, gilt top. Price, #1.00. 

In half calf or half morocco, gilt top, $2.75. 
In limp russia or limp morocco, gilt edges, $3.50. 



One of the most popular as well as most valuable of Ruskin's 
works is " Sesame and Lilies," and this has been brought out by 
McClurg & Co. in a neat and handy volume of good print and 
excellent paper. The publishers have wisely inserted in this volume 
Ruskin's admirable and thoroughly characteristic preface which he 
prepared for the new and revised edition of his works in 1871. 
The size, shape, and compactness of this issue make it an admira- 
ble pocket companion for desultory reading in the cars, in the 
woods, or at the shore. — Evening Transcript, Boston. 

Other editions of this notable and popular book have been 
printed, but none so tastefully as this. Of the book itself it may 
not be inopportune to say that it shows the author at his best, 
being devoted to life instead of art, and embodying Ruskin's ear- 
nestness and gift of language without calling attention to any of 
his oddities and hobbies. — Herald, New York. 

It would be hard to find a better book to put into the hands of a 
youth — boy or girl — at that epoch of life when the spiritual and 
intellectual faculties seem to leap out with a bound from the chrysa- 
lis of the animal nature and determine their direction for life. — 
Home Journal, New York. 

The book is one by all means to be commended to young women 
and young men who care for refinement of character and purity of 
heart and earnestness of purpose, and who are able to appreciate 
noble thought clothed in exquisite diction. — Evangelist, New York. 



Sold by all booksellers, or mailed, on receipt of price, by 

A. C. McCLURG & CO., Publishers, 

Cor. Wabash Ave. and Madison St., Chicago. 



THE STANDARD OPERAS. Their 
Plots, their Music, and their Composers. By 
George P. Upton, author of " Woman in Music," 
etc., etc. 

i2mo, flexible cloth, yellow edges $1.50 

The same, extra gilt, gilt edges *.oo 



" Mr. Upton has performed a service that can hardly be toe 
highly appreciated, in collecting the plots, music, and the com- 
posers of the standard operas, to the number of sixty-four, and 
bringing them together in one perfectly arranged volume. . . . 
His work is one simply invaluable to the general reading pub- 
lic. Technicalities are avoided, the aim being to give to musi- 
cally uneducated lovers of the opera a clear understanding of the 
works they hear. It is description, not criticism, and calculated 
to greatly increase the intelligent enjoyment of music." — Boston 
Traveller. 

" Among the multitude of handbooks which are published 
every year, and are described by easy-going writers of book- 
notices as supplying a long-felt want, we know of none which 
so completely carries out the intention of the writer as ' The 
Standard Operas,' by Mr. George P. Upton, whose object is to 
present to his readers a comprehensive sketch of each of the 
operas contained in the modern repertory. . . . There are 
thousands of music-loving people who will be glad to have the 
kind of knowledge which Mr. Upton has collected for their 
benefit, and has cast in a clear and compact form." — R. H. 
Stoddard, in " Eziening Mail and Express " (iVezu York). 

"The summaries of the plots are so clear, logical, and well 
written, that one can read them with real pleasure, which cannot 
be said of the ordinary operatic synopses. But the most im- 
portant circumstance is that Mr. Upton's book is fully abreast 
of the times." — The Nation (New York). 



Sold by all booksellers, or mailed, post-paid, on receipt 
of price, by 

A. C. McCLURG & CO., Publishers, 
Cor. Wabash Ave. and Madison St., Chicago. 



THE STANDARD ORATORIOS. 
Their Stories, their Music, and their Composers. A 
Handbook. By George P. Upton. i2mo, 335 pages, 
yellow edges, price, #1.50; extra gilt, gilt edges, #2.00. 

In half calf, gilt top .... $3.25 
In half morocco, gilt edges . 3.75 
In tree calf, gilt edges . . . 5.50 

— ♦ 

Music lovers are under a new obligation to Mr. Upton for this 
companion to his ''Standard Operas," — two books which de- 
serve to be placed on the same shelf with Grove's and Riemann's 
musical dictionaries. — The Nation, New York. 

Mr. George P. Upton has followed in the lines that he laid 
down in his " Standard Operas," and has produced an admira- 
ble handwork, which answers every purpose that such a volume 
is designed to answer, and which is certain to be popular now 
and for years to come. — The Mail and Express, Neiv York. 

Like the valuable art hand-books of Mrs. Jamison, these 
volumes contain a world of interesting information, indispensable 
to critics and art amateurs. The volume under review is ele- 
gantly and succinctly written, and the subjects are handled in a 
thoroughly comprehensive manner. — Public Opinion, Wash- 
ington. 

The book is a masterpiece of skilful handling, charming the 
reader with its pure English style, and keeping his attention 
always awake in an arrangement of matter which makes each 
succeeding page and chapter fresh in interest and always full 
of instruction, while always entertaining. — The Standard, 
Chicago 

The author of this book has done a real service to the vast 
number of people who, while they are lovers of music, have 
neither the leisure nor inclination to become deeply versed in its 
literature. . . . The information conveyed is of just the sort that 
the average of cultivated people will welcome as an aid to com- 
prehending and talking about this species of musical composi- 
tion. — Church Magazine, Philadelphia. 



Sold by all booksellers, or mailed on receipt of price, by 

A. C. McCLURG & CO., Publishers, 

Cor. Wabash Ave. and Madison St., Chicago. 



HTHE STANDARD CANTATAS. Their 

■*- Stories, their Music, and their Composers. A Hand- 
book. By George P. Upton. i2mo, 367 pages, yellow 
edges, price, #1.50 ; extra gilt, gilt edges, #2.00. 

In half calf, gilt top .... $3.25 

In half morocco, gilt edges . 3.75 

In tree calf, gilt edges . . . 5.50 

♦ 

The " Standard Cantatas " forms the third volume in the uni-. 
form series which already includes the now well known " Stan- 
dard Operas" and the " Standard Oratorios." This latest work 
deals with a class of musical compositions, midway between the 
opera and the oratorio, which is growing rapidly in favor both 
with composers and audiences. 

As in the two former works, the subject is treated, so far as 
possible, in an untechnical manner, so that it may satisfy the 
needs of musically uneducated music lovers, and add to their en- 
joyment by a plain statement of the story of the cantata and a 
popular analysis of its music, with brief pertinent selections from 
its poetical text. 

The book includes a comprehensive essay on the origin of the 
cantata, and its development from rude beginnings ; biographical 
sketches of the composers ; carefully prepared descriptions of 
the plots and the music ; and an appendix containing the names 
and dates of composition of all the best known cantatas from the 
earliest times. 

This series of works on popular music has steadily grown in 
favor since the appearance of the first volume on the Operas. 
When the series is completed, as it will be next year by a volume 
on the Standard Symphonies, it will be, as the New York 
" Nation ' has said, indispensable to every musical library. 



Sold by all booksellers, or mailed on receipt of price, by 

A. C. McCLURG & CO., Publishers, 

Cor. Wabash Ave. and Madison St., Chicago. 



THE STANDARD SYMPHONIES. 
Their History, their Music, and their Composers. 
A Handbook. By George P. Upton. 121110, 321 pages, 
yellow edges, price $1.50; extra gilt, gilt edges, #2.00. 

In half calf, gilt top .... $3 23 
In half morocco, gilt edges . 3.75 
In tree calf, gilt edges . . . 5.50 



The usefulness of this handbook cannot be doubted. Its 
pages are packed full of these fascinating renderings. The 
accounts of each composer are succinct and yet sufficient. The 
author has done a genuine service to the world of music lovers. 
The comprehension of orchestral work of the highest character 
is aided efficiently by this volume. The mechanical execution 
of the volume is in harmony with its subject. No worthier 
volume can be found to put into the hands of an amateur or a 
friend of music. — Public Opinion, Washington. 

None who have seen the previous books of Mr. Upton will 
need assurance that this is as indispensable as the others to one 
who would listen intelligently to that better class of music which 
musicians congratulate themselves Americans are learning to 
appreciatively enjoy. — Home Journal, New York. 

There has never been, in this country at least, so thorough an 
attempt to collate the facts of programme music. ... As a 
definite helper in some cases and as a refresher in others we 
believe Mr. Upton's book to have a lasting value. . . . The 
book, in brief, shows enthusiastic and honorable educational 
purpose, good taste, and sound scholarship. — The American, 
Philadelphia. 

Upton's books should be read and studied by all who desire to 
acquaint themselves with the facts and accomplishments in these 
interesting forms of musical composition. — The Voice, New 
York. 

It is written in a style that cannot fail to stimulate the reader, 
if also a student of music, to strive to find for himself the under- 
lying meanings of the compositions of the great composers. 
It contains, besides, a vast amount of information about the 
symphony, its evolution and structure, with sketches of the com- 
posers, and a detailed technical description of a few symphonic 
models. It meets a recognized want of all concert goers. — 
The Chautauquan. 



Sold by all booksellers, or mailed on receipt of price, by 
A. C. McCLURG & CO., Publishers, 

Cor. Wabash Ave. and Madison St., Chicago. 



THE STORY OF TONTY. 

AN HISTORICAL ROMANCE. 

By Mrs. Mary Hartwell Catherwood. 
i2mo, 224 pages. Price, $1.25. 



" The Story of Tonty " is eminently a Western story, beginning 
at Montreal, tarrying at Fort Frontenac, and ending at the old fort 
at Starved Rock, on the Illinois River. It weaves the adventures 
of the two great explorers, the intrepid La Salle and his faithful 
lieutenant, Tonty, inio a tale as thrilling and romantic as the de- 
scriptive portions are brilliant and vivid. It is superbly illustrated 
with twenty-three masterly drawings by Mr. Enoch Ward. 

Such tales as this render service past expression to the cause of his- 
tory. They weave a spell in which old chronicles are vivified and breathe 
out human life Mrs. Catherwood, in thus bringing out from the treasure- 
houses of half- forgotten historical record things new and old, has set her- 
self one of the worthiest literary tasks of her generation, and is showing 
herself finely adequate to its fulfilment. — Transcript, Boston. 

A powerful story by a writer newly sprung to fame. . . . All the 
century we have been waiting for the deft hand that could put flesh upon 
the dry bones of our early heroes. Here is a recreation indeed. . . . One 
comes from the reading of the romance with a quickened interest in our 
early national history, and a profound admiration for the art that can so 
transport us to the dreamful realms where fancy is monarch of fact. — 
Press, Philadelphia. 

"The Story of Tonty" is full of the atmosphere of its time. It 
betrays an intimate and sympathetic knowledge of the great age of ex- 
plorers, and it is altogether a charming piece of work. — Christian 
Union, New York. 

Original in treatment, in subject, and in all the details of mise en 
scene, it must stand unique among recent romances. — News, Chicago. 



Sold by all booksellers, or mailed, on receipt of price, by 

A. C. McCLURG & CO., Publishers, 

Cor. Wabash Ave. and Madison St., Chicago. 



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